The Trump administration's school safety commission held its first public listening session Wednesday, a day after the panel's chair, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, told lawmakers on Capitol Hill that the commission wouldn't focus on guns.
Alessia Modjarrad, a graduating high school senior from Montgomery County, Md., spoke at the day-long event at the Education Department in D.C. She said the few solutions being offered by the administration were "misguided and insufficient."
"I would ask to please consider the possibilities that guns are the most important aspect of the purview of this commission," Modjarrad said.
Then she issued a challenge.
"I would ask Secretary DeVos and the federal commission to take on the burden of positive, ever-lasting change from school children and heavily reconsider the current complicit stance on the role of guns in school safety."
That challenge will have to be relayed to DeVos at a later time. DeVos didn't attend the listening session. She was in Switzerland where she's set to deliver a keynote address at forum exploring apprenticeship programs and primary and vocational school education in the Netherlands, according to a press release by the Education Department.
On Tuesday, DeVos was asked by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., during a Senate subcommittee hearing: "So, you are studying gun violence, but not considering the role of guns?"
DeVos responded: "That is not part of the commission's charge, per se."
President Trump established the school safety commission in response to the mass shooting in February at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, where 17 students and faculty were killed.
When established in March, one of the stated goals in the White House release was a focus on "age restrictions for certain firearms purchases."
During Wednesday's listening session, Deputy Education Secretary Mick Zais tried to clarify how the commission would handle guns.
After citing a Congressional Research Service report that found there are approximately 300 million firearms in the U.S., he said the commission would be exploring "narrow aspects of gun ownership."
"The commission will not be looking at ways to confiscate those weapons or abrogate the second amendment, but what we will be doing is looking at specific age limits for the purchase of specific kinds of weapons," Zais said.
"And we will be examining legal procedures for the confiscation of weapons from people with identified mental health issues."