Brown University Student Survives Second School Shooting: Mia Tretta's Ongoing Fight for Campus Safety

Saugus High School mass shooting survivor Mia Tretta

When Brown University junior Mia Tretta received an emergency alert during finals week, she desperately hoped it wasn't happening again.

In 2019, Tretta survived a mass shooting at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita, California, where she suffered an abdominal wound. The tragedy claimed two students' lives and injured three others, including Tretta, who was only 15 at the time.

On Saturday, while studying in her dorm with a friend, Tretta's phone buzzed with an initial alert warning of an emergency at the university's engineering building. She tried to convince herself it couldn't possibly be another shooting.

As subsequent alerts arrived instructing people to lock down and stay away from windows, the familiar language confirmed her worst fears. By day's end, two people had died and nine others were injured in the Providence, Rhode Island, campus shooting.

"No individual should ever experience one shooting, let alone two," Tretta shared during a Sunday phone interview. "As someone who was shot at my high school when I was 15, I never imagined I would face this trauma again."

Tretta's experience reflects the disturbing reality facing a generation now attending college—students who grew up practicing lockdown drills, only to encounter the same violence years later at institutions that should have represented safety.

Recent years have seen small groups of students endure multiple mass shootings at different educational stages, including survivors of the 2018 Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre in Parkland, Florida, who later experienced a deadly shooting at Florida State University in April.

Another Brown student, Zoe Weissman, shared on social media about attending middle school adjacent to Parkland during that mass shooting. She recounted being outside when it happened, hearing gunshots and screams, witnessing first responders, and later viewing videos of the event.

Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg posted on Facebook that his son Ben, a Brown junior, safely barricaded himself and roommates inside their room with furniture. Mayor Greenberg himself survived an assassination attempt during his 2022 campaign.

Following her high school shooting experience, Tretta became an advocate for stricter gun legislation, rising to leadership within Students Demand Action. Her advocacy work brought her to the White House during former President Biden's administration and meetings with former Attorney General Merrick Garland.

She has specifically focused on combating "ghost guns"—weapons like the one used at her high school that can be assembled from parts, making owner regulation and tracking difficult.

At Brown, Tretta had been working on a paper examining the educational journeys of school shooting survivors—research directly influenced by her personal experience. The assignment was due within days.

Tretta, studying international and public affairs and education, noted Saturday was her first active shooter alert at Brown.

"I selected Brown, a place I love, because it felt like somewhere I could finally feel safe and establish normality as a school shooting survivor," she explained. "And now it's happened again. And it was preventable."