The start of this year was not a happy one for the people of Moscow.
Just 10 days into 2015 the community was rocked by a shooting incident that killed three and injured one
Throughout the rest of the year people tried to recover from the tragic event, but it is still fresh in everyone”s mind.
The aftermath of the incident displayed the blatant truth that Moscow is as strong as ever. The people in this community have the incredible ability to come together and support one another in times of tragedy, and it has always been this way.
The rest of 2015 wasn”t exactly easy, either – both for the people of Moscow and the rest of the world. Multiple incidents of extreme violence or major injustices took over national and international headlines this year. While the events themselves were terrible, the reaction they spurred from college students was promising.
From declaring their support for Paris after the terrorist attacks last month to the protests at the University of Missouri prompting responses from colleges across the nation, students have been more active on larger issues this year than ever before.
More young people are standing for what they believe in, and it”s due to an increase in awareness from the general public of these important issues. Students at the University of Idaho and other institutions were never totally ignorant of certain issues or problems that have been discussed this year, but there”s no denying that more students are involved now.
This involvement will yield positive results in the long-term as well as the short-term. As more young people feel comfortable to speak out on issues they feel passionately about, the youth demographic will have a greater ability to make a difference on a larger scale.
The protests at Mizzou also had relevance to the staff at The Argonaut, as it involved the school”s student media program. As members of a media organization, 2015 was impactful for many young journalists across the United States.
The controversy of the Mizzou protests spurred conversations about the rights of student journalists, but there were also shocking events that took place in the professional world of reporting.
Early into the fall semester, the news station WDBJ7 was stunned when a reporter and cameraman were shot dead during a live broadcast. This tragic event rocked the entire journalism world, but the employees of WDBJ7 showed incredible strength in the days after the incident, similar to the response the people of Moscow had following the shooting in January.
The tragedy on Jan. 10 was not the first tragedy to hit Moscow, and it won”t be the last. However, it is through times of hardship that Moscow shows its true strength, and its citizens and the connections that bind it together only come out stronger in the end.
– EB