
In 2024, Students Demand Action volunteers reminded the gun safety movement that we are not the future—we are the now.
This year, we grew to more than 850 groups across the country, and those groups truly brought the action. Our students:
- Organized divestment campaigns in partnership with the Everytown Support Fund on their campuses,
- Found new ways with the Everytown Support Fund to spread the word about the gun industry’s #KillerBusiness,
- Made their voices heard in state legislatures and on Capitol Hill as they advocated for common-sense gun safety laws, and
- Helped make over 12 million voter contacts while sweeping 3,300 Gun Sense Candidates to victory in 2024.
As we close out 2024, we’re grateful for students like you who shared your stories, time, and energy with us. We’re stronger because of you! Keep reading to see what else we’re celebrating from 2024, where we’re going in 2025, and how you can join the fight to end gun violence.
Industry Accountability
The gun industry has a perverse interest in perpetuating gun violence—it rakes in $9 billion each year while we pay the price with our lives. Despite fueling a public health crisis that is the leading cause of death for our generation, the gun industry continues to fly under the radar and skirt accountability for the harm, death, and trauma its products cause.
We are not good with that—and we’re working to change that reality.
In January, in partnership with Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, Students Demand Action organized a divestment week of action across university campuses to call out colleges for fueling the gun industry’s financial empire through their investments.

While students were spreading the word on college campuses, others were crashing the gun industry’s annual party in Las Vegas. On the first day of SHOT Show, students and survivors shared their stories at a rally exposing the gun industry’s role in our gun violence crisis.
Then, students took to the streets to remind the gun industry that their deadly products are the number one killer of our generation—and we’re not going to let them keep skirting accountability.

Just days after the 2024 election, Students Demand Action and the Everytown Support Fund launched a new campaign calling out gun industry leaders for prioritizing their profits over our safety. Using dark humor, gun industry caricatures, and ripped-from-the-headlines themes, our campaign presents young people with an urgent message: The gun industry is selling your safety. Are You Good With That?


Investing in Communities
In May, Students Demand Action partnered with the What I Wish I Knew Foundation (WIWIK) to bring violence interruption strategies to five high schools in the Philadelphia area. The “Don’t Get Tricked Out Ya Spot” Conflict Resolution Tour had one mission: To teach students critical conflict resolution skills to reduce violence in their lives and city.

Students Demand Action also partnered with StaySolid Youth Mental Health to bring the “Motivating OUR Future Summit” to four schools in Maryland. The tour was designed to encourage students in communities disproportionately impacted by gun violence to set goals, work hard in school, and reduce conflicts by delivering powerful messages on conflict resolution, accountability, and achieving goals.

This summer, we hosted our sixth Summer Leadership Academy (SLA), this time in Chicago. The SLA organizing team tailored the curriculum to focus on subjects impacting the local community. They also brought in partner organizations so students could hear firsthand experiences of the challenges—and strengths—in the Southwest Chicago community.
Throughout the week, participants developed impact proposals for action projects. Action projects educate and/or activate their peers and community about gun violence prevention. Participants use these projects to return their SLA learnings to their communities.

Coming out of a 2023 SLA action project proposal, students attended a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a renovated basketball court in North Lawndale, Chicago. Students and community members had identified the court and surrounding neighborhood park as a vital community gathering space.
“It’s not every day that we get to acutely feel the effects of our work in the gun violence prevention movement, so this is much more than renovating a basketball court. It’s a testament of our community’s commitment to reducing gun violence and creating a safe environment where young people can thrive.”
—Justin Funez, an SDA National Organizing Board Member from Chicago and one of the students who came up with the idea to renovate the court.
SDA partnered with Chicago Cares and UCAN to complete the basketball court renovation. Thanks to funding from the Everytown Community Safety Fund, a program of the Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, and the Vitalogy Foundation, these organizations restored the court, which was underutilized because of its poor condition. This project engaged young people in creating a safe space for students, local youth, and community members to play outside.
HBCU Outreach
Student leaders at historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) have demonstrated their leadership by leading election actions, engaging over 10,000 voters, and bringing new students into the gun violence prevention movement.


Jackson State University students organized phone banks and Jackson State’s tradition “Stroll to the Polls” on Election Day. At Florida A&M University, students led transformational initiatives, including two dorm storms where students knocked on more than 600 doors, a text banking party the night before Election Day, and a Gun Sense Candidate information session in partnership with Kappa Alpha Psi.
We even hit the road and visited HBCU campuses this year. We met over 40 students and even started a new Students Demand Action group at North Carolina A&T University.
Fresh Look, Same Fight
Students Demand Action started as a pilot program in 2016 under Everytown for Gun Safety. But within two weeks of the horrific 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, we launched our national program.
Over the last six years, we’ve grown from zero volunteers to more than 850 Students Demand Action groups. This year, we launched our new brand identity in recognition of the energy and breadth of our movement. Our Creative Team held extensive interviews and branding exercises with current and former staff and student volunteers to help support the redesign and our movement’s expansion.
The Students Demand Action brand is heavily influenced by the rich history of grassroots activism in the United States. Bold and strong—yet nuanced and humanistic—our headline typeface is inspired by protest signs from the Memphis Sanitation Workers’ Strike of 1968. We also introduced graphic elements that reference the nature and energy of grassroots activism.
Want to see more? Click around our website to explore the new color palette and textual designs, or learn more about our Anthem Award-winning redesign.
People, Power, Purpose
Our student leaders made our voices heard at state capitols this year. Our students showed up—at Advocacy Days and throughout the year—to connect with lawmakers across the country.
Our efforts made an impact in:
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California
15 new Students Demand Action groups in California got started and immediately took action in their communities. Some of our newest student leaders were instrumental in the passage of AB 1858, which will establish guidelines and procedures for active shooter drills in our schools.
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Colorado
Students in Colorado relentlessly advocated for gun safety. They spent hours in committee hearings to testify about legislation and hosted a rally during Colorado’s Advocacy Day. And their work paid off: the Colorado legislature passed six gun violence prevention bills!
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Georgia
More than five new Students Demand Action groups started in Georgia this year. After the Apalachee High School shooting, students jumped into action. They spoke to lawmakers and hosted walkouts at high schools in surrounding areas. And they’re ready to continue advocating in 2025!
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Kansas
In Kansas, when lawmakers introduced a bill that would have enshrined the right to bear arms in the Kansas Constitution, our students spoke out. And the bill was defeated in committee later in the legislative session!
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Maine
In Maine, students organized to pass laws to:
- Establish waiting periods for purchasing firearms,
- Expand background check requirements, and
- Take another solid step toward a true Extreme Risk Protection Order law.
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Missouri
In Missouri, students at the University of Missouri-Kansas City worked hard to register voters. At one point, they reached nearly 100 folks on campus in just three days of voter registration!
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New York
Students in New York showed up and showed out at their Advocacy Day. Their efforts helped pass a first-of-its-kind bill to hold bad actors in the gun industry accountable for the safety of their weapons.
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North Carolina
In North Carolina, students held dozens of events to get out the vote across the state. From dorm storms, phonebanks, and more, students made over 15,000 voter contacts to help elect Gun Sense Candidates. Their efforts helped to elect a gun sense governor and attorney general. They also broke the legislative supermajority, paving the way for future gun sense wins!
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Oregon
In Oregon, newer high school groups jumped into action to host phonebanks and meetings to help get out the vote for Gun Sense Candidates. And after the election, high school students were quick to support us with the kickoff of the Are You Good with That? campaign and billboard unveiling!
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Tennessee
Our Tennessee students continued pushing the state legislature to take meaningful action to save lives by:
- Rallying against the passing of an arming teachers bill,
- Holding walkouts and marching to the state capitol, and
- Continually meeting with lawmakers.
In June, Students Demand Action volunteers from across the country gathered in Washington, D.C., for Everytown’s annual Gun Sense University (GSU) convening. This year’s GSU fell during Pride Month, a time to celebrate the history, resilience, accomplishments, and beauty of the LGBTQ+ community.
Students Demand Action celebrated with a social outing to the Capital Pride Festival during GSU for LGBTQIA+ students and allies. At D.C. Pride, queer students and allies built community and reminded each other that LGBTQIA+ identities are beautiful and deserve to be celebrated. The gathering served as a grounding practice and reminder of ways we disarm hate: by loving ourselves, loving each other, and lifting each other up.

Days later, following live remarks from President Biden at Gun Sense University, our students joined hundreds of volunteers from all 50 states and D.C. took to Capitol Hill for our largest federal advocacy day. We demanded that every member of Congress take meaningful action to end our nation’s gun violence crisis.

Our students kept that energy up heading into the fall election season. The election results at the top of the ticket were not what we had worked so hard for, but we did make a positive impact in the 2024 elections. We swept 3,300 Gun Sense Candidates to victory, including hundreds of our own volunteers.
We showed up this election cycle, with more students than ever engaging in our elections work. Together, Students Demand Action and Moms Demand Action volunteers made over 12 million voter contacts this election cycle. Those phone calls, text messages, door knocks, postcards, and conversations were not in vain.
Every conversation students like you started, every event you hosted, and every person you reached spread the message that change is possible—one action at a time.
Because when we come together, we can shift the narrative and drive real impact. And with more students participating in our elections work this year than ever before, we can see that impact now.
Looking Ahead
In 2024, you met each moment with determination. In every state and in D.C., students just like you have shown what’s possible when young people take action.
We’re ready to carry that forward into 2025, and we’ve got some New Year’s Resolutions we can’t wait to work on:
- Push back against attempts to weaken gun safety laws
- Call out lawmakers who cower to the gun lobby
- Stand up to misogyny, racism, homophobia, and transphobia
- Hold the gun industry’s #KillerBusiness accountable
- Never stop fighting for a future free from gun violence!
We’re ready to take action. Are you?
Join Us in 2025
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