George and Amal Clooney donate $500,000 to students organising ‘March for our Life’

Amal and George Clooney are donating a half a million dollars to the students organising marches against gun violence following the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School last week.

The actor said that he and his human rights lawyer wife were “inspired” by the efforts undertaken by the high school students in the wake of a tragedy that has sent tremblers through their community and the nation.

“Amal and I are so inspired by the courage and eloquence of these young men and women from Stoneman Douglas High School,” he wrote in a statement Tuesday.

“Our family will be there on March 24 to stand side by side with this incredible generation of young people from all over the country, and in the name of our children Ella and Alexander, we’re donating $500,000 to help pay for this groundbreaking event. Our children’s lives depend on it.”

The Clooney donation prompted several other celebrities to announce they would match those donations. Oprah Winfrey announced soon after that she would also donate $500,000 to the cause, as did Steven Spielberg and his wife Kate Capshaw. Jeffrey and Marilyn Katzenberg also said they would donate half a million dollars.

"George and Amal, I couldn't agree with you more," Oprah wrote on Twitter. "I am joining forces with you and will match your $500,000 donation to 'March For Our Lives.' These inspiring young people remind me of the Freedom Riders of the 60s who also said we've had ENOUGH and our voices will be heard."

After a 19-year-old gunman killed 17 people and injured as many as a dozen more, funerals have been taking place to lay the dead to rest.

Meanwhile, students from the school have made it their mission to try and ensure that theirs is the last mass school shooting that America must endure, organising what promises to be a massive march in Washington DC next month, which has inspired spin-off marches across the country.

“Every singe person up here today, all these people should be home grieving,” Emma Gonzalez, an 18-year-old senior from the school, said Saturday at an anti-gun rally in Ft Lauderdale. “But instead we are up here standing together because if all our government and President can do is send thoughts and prayers, then it’s time for victims to be the change that we need to see.”

Ms Gonzalez and a group of her classmates have been spent countless hours since the shooting Wednesday huddling together at each other’s homes, organising an effort to push gun control measures. They announced the “March for our Lives” march Sunday, with an expressed goal of making sure that politicians who have accepted money from the National Rifle Association (NRA) are not re-elected during this November’s midterm elections.

Their organising has resulted in an outpouring of support on the group’s Facebook page, with local chapters pledging that they will hold their own rallies on the same day as the national march in Washington.