On Aug. 27, in the church of the Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis, Minnesota, two children, ages 8 and 10, were killed and 21 others were injured.

On Sept. 10, in Evergreen, Colorado,  a male student at Evergreen High School shot and injured two teenagers at the school. When police arrived they found the shooter had also killed himself.

On Sept. 12, during a Friday night football game at Southwest Edgecombe High School,  two teens, one 16-year-old girl and a 17-year-old boy were injured.

The shooters in all three cases were between the ages  of 16 and 23. According to Education Week, these are all dates of school shootings that happened this year in the United States.

According to CNN, as of Oct. 27, there have been 64 school shootings in the United States so far this year. Thirty seven were on college campuses and 27 were K-12 school grounds.

The main reason I was thinking about these shootings and wanted to write an opinion piece was because of my older sister. She works at Concord West Side Elementary as a preschool paraprofessional. One day I got home from college as a commuter student does. I noticed that my older sister who also just got home from work was a bit down, more than usual. So I asked her what was wrong.

She would go on to tell me, “How do I explain to young children that we’re practicing just in case someone comes into the school and wants to take your life?”

When we were talking she explained to me that practicing active shooter and lockdown drills was important to her and she definitely thought it’s great that they do this. One thing she did hate about it was having to tell students that are 3 to 5 years old, to stack their chairs on the door and move out of sight.

She would tell me, “How do I tell a young child they have to stay quiet or else they will never see another day? How do I explain that we have to stay quiet, in the dark, all bunched up to hopefully survive? How do I explain, when someone comes knocking on the door or tries to open the door, that doesn’t mean check to see who’s there, but means stay quiet and don’t open the door?”

Listening to my sister tell me this, all while her voice starts to crack because of the emotion she has to go through, seeing their little faces go from having so much fun to being scared in a dark corner. She tells me she hopes nothing ever happens, but knows that one day this all might be a reality.

My sister completely understands why this practice is necessary, but what I don’t understand is how to explain to a kid that someone they have never seen before wants to kill them, without any reason behind it. I understand that our laws were made to be fair and equal, but did we ever think that some of these laws don’t think about how a human being is living, being treated or what they’ve gone through?

The ease of buying a weapon is terrible. According to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, background checks are required when buying from a federally licensed dealer, but not when it’s a private seller.

That drives me crazy and will always drive me crazy. Because how can someone at the age of 18, who has only been driving a vehicle for two years, legally have every legal right to buy a rifle or shotgun from a federally licensed dealer? This is someone who can’t even take a sip of alcohol, but they’re able to own a weapon, something that can cause harm to themselves and other people.

This conversation with my sister opened my eyes to see the toll these shootings take on not only the victims and their families, but all children. I understand that this topic is a complex subject and there is a big division and disagreement about what to do about gun rights and gun restrictions. But in the midst of all this I wonder if we could implement more rules and laws to prevent these shootings from continuing.

I would like to see more training go into how to handle these weapons, even as normal citizens we should know what a weapon can really do. What I hope to see is people who own guns to get monthly check ups on their current state and maybe even have to go through certain tests to make sure that they are physically and mentally stable enough to own a weapon.

I hope the day never comes for when my sister tells me a school shooting happened in her school or for me to find it on the news. I pray that peace can be spread around the world. It might be a lot to ask, but I hope one day it can happen.