Three students shot at suburban Denver high school: How many wake-up calls does America need?

Three teenagers were shot Wednesday at Evergreen High School in suburban Denver after one of them opened fire with a handgun, leaving a community reeling and a nation asking how many wake-up calls it will take before schools are safe.

Within minutes, officers from across the Denver area swarmed the forested campus of 900 students. Parents huddled outside nearby schools, clutching phones, searching for answers, and grappling with the familiar horror of gun violence that has haunted Jefferson County since the Columbine massacre in 1999.

A familiar scene in a new town

The shooting began just after 12:30 p.m. inside and outside Evergreen High, about 30 miles west of Denver, according to the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office. None of the law enforcement officers who responded fired a weapon, spokesperson Jacki Kelley told AP.Within minutes, more than 100 officers swarmed the forest-ringed campus of 900 students. Parents waited anxiously at a nearby elementary school to reunite with their children.

Critical injuries, fleeting relief

All three teens were rushed to St. Anthony Hospital in Lakewood. Initially listed in critical condition, one was later upgraded to stable with what trauma director Dr. Brian Blackwood described to AP as “non-life threatening injuries.”

The human toll, however, was captured not in statistics but in the voices of parents. Wendy Nueman told The Denver Post her 15-year-old daughter borrowed a phone to call home. “She just said she was OK. She couldn’t hardly speak,” Nueman said, holding back tears. “It’s super scary. We feel like we live in a little bubble here. Obviously, no one is immune.”

A community in shock

Neighbors, too, stepped in. Don Cygan, a retired educator, told Denver’s KUSA-TV that 18 students fleeing the cafeteria knocked on his door and took shelter.

His wife, a retired nurse, treated them for shock. “I hope they feel like they ran to the right house,” he said.

From Columbine to Evergreen

Jefferson County has lived this nightmare before. Columbine was supposed to be the lesson that transformed safety in America’s schools. But a generation later, another campus in the same county is stained with blood.The pattern repeats: emergency response, candlelight vigils, and calls for reform that rarely materialize into meaningful change.

How many wake-up calls?

Every parent’s fear — the unanswered phone, the text that doesn’t come is now routine in a nation where lockdown drills begin earlier than algebra lessons. Each shooting is described as unthinkable, yet America seems to think about little else before moving on.Three teens in Evergreen now join a growing list of survivors. And once again, the country is left asking: how many wake-up calls does it need before schools stop doubling as battlegrounds?