DALLAS — Social media is often the most divided place, but on Tuesday it might have been the most united.
A high school band in Bandera posted a clip of members in maroon playing Uvalde’s fight song.
A mom in the same color in Garland tweeted video of her young daughter trying to say, “Uvalde strong.”
Districts across the state, from Lancaster to Lubbock and far beyond, posted pictures of students, faculty and staff wearing the Uvalde CISD colors and sending strength to the community on their first day back after the worst days ever.
Lancaster ISD superintendent Katrice Perera, dressed in a maroon jacket, said it made her proud to see so many in her district supporting a community hours away.
“Truly down deep as an educator, we really wanted to honor those parents who had students who could not board that bus today or teachers who had kids who didn’t show up in their classroom today,” Perera said. “Or students who had friends they could not play with today.”
Photos showed some of Lancaster’s youngest students smiling – not quite old enough to understand the gravity of what happened.
To them, maroon just meant helping kids who hurt.
Alexandra Acevedo, a fifth grader in Garland, was old enough to grasp a little more.
She was wearing a maroon polo shirt in class.
“I’m wearing this color because what happened in Uvalde is very important for the students and staff who lost a lot of people,” she said.
In Uvalde on Tuesday, there was an excruciating emptiness.
Eliahna Torres’s mother shared a photo from her 10-year-old daughter’s grave, where she spent what should have been Eliahna’s first day of fifth grade.
Uziyah Garcia’s father bared his soul on Facebook. He wrote that seeing people in maroon was a comfort. But he shared a photo of the urn that holds his son’s ashes, calling that Uziyah’s first day of school picture.
Perera said what happened in Uvalde is a reminder.
While so many things divide us, one belief should connect us.
“The one place kids should be able to go to and be safe is definitely school,” she said.