Students protest Trayvon Martin death with hoodies

DETROIT (WXYZ) - The death of Trayvon Martin has deeply hurt students at Plymouth Preparatory High School who did not even know the 17-year-old.

“It was really something that I decided to pay attention to because it was so blatant,” said junior Alvin Anderson. 

 After hearing about the shooting death  of Martin,  the high school students took a stand.  Since Martin was wearing a hoodie when he died, the teens wore their own sweat shirts with hoods to school Monday.  

“It makes people want to watch the news more and get more involved with what’s going on around them and it makes them think wow this is reality… like where can we be safe,” said  junior Saamyia Munir.

The kids were looking for ways to honor Martin.  “We just really brain stormed any type of way we could protest…  just doing something,” said Anderson.

Many students put messages on their hoodie sweatshirts.  Munir had “Don’t  Shoot, I’m educated” printed on her sweatshirt. 

“I felt like not only could it have been me or somebody else in the school… but like it was him and I feel he deserves more,” said Munir.

“If you want these things to cease, be about action.  Not about words. So take a stand and do something even if it’s something as simple as making a sign,” said Anderson.

A group of rappers called Real Music is made up of students at Plymouth Prep. They came up with the idea of taping messages to the back of their sweat shirts. 

Many of the teens are amazed at how the protest has brought the entire school together. 

“We’re all here on earth and we might as well work together.  Everybody is going to be different,” said senior Darin Elkins-Robinson.   “That’s okay, that’s normal.”

 Have a sense of urgency about these things because we’re all human and that’s the fact of the matter it doesn’t matter the color of your skin that’s what I want everybody to take from this,” said Anderson.

The students may plan another event where they will wear the hoodies again.