‘It just doesn’t add up’: Amid Ferguson fallout, students sound off on race in America

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• ERIN DEVANY:

  I feel like after hearing about the situation, I realized that if we have to protest the killing of unarmed youth in our nation, then we really don't live in a free country at all.

• MICHAEL BRAXTON:

  I shouldn't be scared because of the color of my skin, whether you're white, Mexican, black, Indian – we should all have the same justice. I mean, it just doesn't add up to me.

• YAHYA YUSSUF:

  I feel like Ferguson was like a true showing of what the nation truly feels about equality between minorities and the majorities in certain communities.

• HENRY CHAVEZ:

  It's definitely let me know that justice and race are still a big topic to focus on in America — that racism is still something that exists and that equality amongst races themselves isn't fully met yet.

• ANTHONY PALMER:

  After the events of Ferguson, I found a magazine about racial profiling from July 30 of 2001. This magazine brought to my attention that even since 2001, racial profiling has been still present and that our government is kind of ignoring what's happening in today's world.

• KYRA ADAMS:

  Racial stereotypes have always played an active role in our society today, and when things like this happen, it kind of reminds us the severity with which they are still a part of it. But having the media expose it the way that it has, has brought it to light to thousands of other citizens that would normally turn a blind eye to it.

• KADEN JETT:

  I believe that police officers have too much power to not be responsible with it. The police officer should have went for the Taser as opposed for the gun, and then Michael Brown would have been in the jail as opposed to the morgue.

  PBS NewsHour education coverage is part of American Graduate: Let's Make it Happen, a public media initiative made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.