Sandy Hook Victims Are Remembered on Day They Would Have Graduated

As the graduates of Newtown High School filed across an outdoor stage in Sandy Hook, Conn., on Wednesday evening, shaking hands and receiving diplomas, 20 of their classmates were missing.

For the dozens of seniors who had also attended Sandy Hook Elementary School, those classmates have been missing for more than 11 years. They were in first grade on Dec. 14, 2012, when a gunman attacked their school in one of the most horrific mass shootings in U.S. history. Twenty students — ages 6 and 7 — and six faculty members were shot and killed.

The seniors pinned green ribbons that read “we choose love” and “forever in our hearts” to their blue and white graduation gowns. They sat on folding chairs on their school’s football field and listened as their principal read the 20 names of the would-be graduates.

“Their names were supposed to be read on that day, and the fact that they weren’t there is awful,” said Matt Holden, 17, who survived the shooting at Sandy Hook. “They should have been there.”

Nicole Hockley, whose son Dylan was 6 when he was killed in the shooting, said the high school had been considerate to the victims’ families, offering remembrances in the yearbook and inviting them to Wednesday’s ceremony, which she decided not to attend.

She said in an interview that she did not want to bring anyone down as they prepared for the excitement of their graduation.