The families of the 150th class of East High School Angels filled the Denver Coliseum on Tuesday afternoon for graduation.
Their kids had survived four brutal years. And it was finally time to celebrate.
In elementary and middle school, these students had suffered a pandemic that brought online schooling, political upheaval, mass grief, economic uncertainty and class in masks.
In their first weeks of high school, finally unmasked, they walked the halls of the stately old school off Colfax Avenue, eyeing the photos of alumni, proof that success could be found here: Douglas Fairbanks, Pam Grier, Don Cheadle, Judy Collins and so many more.
They were naive to the violence, grief and political strife they would face over the next four years.
That innocence only lasted a few months.
“We were forced to grow up quicker than we may have expected,” senior and “Head Angel” Cristina Youngquist told her classmates.
A winter shooting
The winter of their first year, on Feb. 13, junior Luis Garcia read a poem to teacher Andy Bucher’s English class.
“My city is the sound of gunshots,” the student read. “It's getting shot just ‘cause you were at the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Tragically, Garcia was shot outside East just a few hours later; he died two weeks later.
“We all thought that he had written poetry, not prophecy,” Bucher wrote in Chalkbeat.
Is this what high school was? These new Angels were grieving again.
A spring shooting
A few weeks later, a new East student showed up late. Austin Lyle, 17, had been kicked out of Overland High School after he was found with an AR-15. On this spring morning at East, he walked past wilted flowers at a memorial to Garcia and into the school, where he faced a mandatory daily bag check.
The staff member who normally handled the search wasn’t there, so Dean Eric Sinclair, who did not know about Lyle’s gun history, took over.
During the search, Sinclair saw a bulge in Lyle’s hoodie and realized it was a gun. Lyle tried to run, but Sinclair blocked the door. Lyle pulled out the gun and shot two deans. Both were injured but survived. Lyle drove to the mountains and shot himself fatally.
A few Angels left the school altogether, afraid. Hundreds walked out of class and protested at the statehouse. Others steeled themselves to whatever might come next.
Is this what high school was? More panic? More fear? More grief?
Denver Public Schools had shown a “shocking disregard” for mass shootings, a federal judge wrote years later, in response to Sinclair’s lawsuit against Denver Public Schools.
"It just gets scary and scarier to be honest," student Gavin Wehrle told Denverite at the time. "School hasn't really been feeling safe recently, to be honest."
Armed police officers, whom the school board had banished from campuses after the George Floyd protests, returned. Teachers tried to talk to students about all that was happening. Staff tried to protect the Angels.
As though shootings weren’t enough, bomb threats were posted to social media. Another kid brought a gun to school.
These incidents weren’t as traumatizing. Nobody died. The Angels learned the best they could.
Shifting political winds
Tens of thousands of new immigrants arrived in Denver from 2022 to 2024. Some were seeking asylum and refugee status, fleeing oppressive governments. Many of their children attended East. Students and faculty welcomed them, even when they did not share a language.
But Trump’s election and promises of mass deportation sweeps frightened these new Angels. DPS pledged to defend them. Educators stood by their students. But worries remained: Could ICE agents flood the school?
Meanwhile, these new Angels studied English and tried to make the best of the opportunity their families had sought in this country.
Those mass raids never happened – not at school, anyway.
Meanwhile, students fought for all-gender bathrooms with private stalls and won. Trans and gender-nonconforming students finally felt seen, valued, and included.
But the Trump administration turned the bathrooms into the target of its anti-trans campaign, claiming they violated federal law. The students’ act of gender inclusion was recast as discrimination by an administration attempting to erase trans identities and force all to conform to the gender binary.
Trans students lived in fear as the government investigated East for Title IX violations that could impact federal funding, alleging the all-gender bathroom had taken space from girls. The converted bathrooms remained open to all.
But mostly, things quieted down.
Routines resumed. Despite a lingering sadness and anxiety, Angels found joy where they could.
They read books and wrote papers, took tests and more tests, standardized and not.
Some excelled. Others flubbed. Most tried.
They played on sports teams and strummed guitars, beat drums and blew horns in musical ensembles, wrote for the school paper and practiced drills with ROTC.
They sneaked off campus, flooding Colfax, for sandwiches and coffee and pizza and a break.
They met in Cheesman Park for photos before prom, then danced and sweated through tuxedos and dresses. Some kissed the morning sun.
On Tuesday, those East High School students who entered school during that year of gun violence took their seats at the Coliseum. The red-robed kids listened to speeches. The choir sang a dirge rendition of “The Times Are A-Changin'.”
There was a lot of talk about resilience and learning to get through hard things and kindness. These students knew how to do all that better than most.
“Be proud of the way that you've shown up and hold space for the good you've done in your time as an angel,” Youngquist said.
The Angels’ parents were proud, relieved. Their friends cheered. So did the graduates. They had survived.
As more than 500 names were announced, the Angels crossed the stage, grinning to the blasts of airhorns and the shrieks of their families.
They walked toward college or trade schools or retail jobs. Toward successes and mistakes and love and love lost and more grief, the kind they learned about too young. Toward whatever adventures and ecstasies and heartaches and banalities they will choose or face. Toward life. And beyond.
The Angels shifted the tassel from one side of their mortarboard to the other. They tossed their caps in the air. They had graduated.
Editor’s note: Reporter Kyle Harris was a mentor of a member of the East High School class of 2026.
