Alfonso Calderon

Alfonso Calderon is a co-founder of the #NeverAgain movement, and so the 16-year-old has been busy giving interviews, planning the March for Our Lives protest and, yes, going to school. “I don’t get to sleep anymore,” he said. “I know I’m a goofball, but I am kind of smart. I am studious, so I’ll find a way to manage with it.” In a six-minute speech at a Tallahassee rally in February that went viral, Calderon condemned the patronizing and placating he felt was coming from adults. Now that he’s had a little more time to see the bigger picture, he said, “I’ve realized that the one thing people really take for granted is love. I hate to sound cheesy, but that’s what I’ve been missing in my life, you know, hugging my parents that five extra seconds, telling them I love them when I go out of the house, because I don’t know if I’m ever going to get to say it to them again.”