AVA SCHNEIDER

ava schneider was born september 14th, 1995 in bakersfield california to leslie macher and brett schneider. her parents weren't yet married, they were both in pre-laws in college, with leslie in her sophomore year and brett in his junior year. leslie put off her junior year to focus on being a mother. while ava was still young, her uncle and his best friend went on a killing spree in her mom's childhood home. they were visiting home at the time, but leslie took ava and brett to a hotel for the night so they would be safe and stu could have his party. ava wasn't old enough to remember anything from that night, but it would continue to reverberate throughout her life.

ava would get a younger brother three years after her birth, and one year after the woodsboro murders. vincent 'vince' was leslie and brett's second and last child, they didn't intend to have any more children after that.

her mother never really healed from her younger brother being a murderer and ava was too young to understand that. leslie did her best to be a good mom to her and ava certainly thought she was growing up. she was always supported. her mom and dad made sure she and her younger brother always had what they needed. money was tight though, they had a single income household when they always meant to have two. as ava grew up, she started noticing more and more that her parents weren't happy. they were fighting, her mom was struggling with her memory. she was fourteen when it really got bad. ava had always been forced to be a second maternal figure to vince even though he was three years younger, she started having to step up more. she made sure he got his homework done, or that her parents remembered when he had school activities or things to do with friends. she felt pressure to learn to drive as soon as possible so that she could drive herself around places and be more responsible. 

ava was always an academic. she enjoyed learning and had always found school to be her safe space. she studied hard and was on the honor roll in middle school and high school. her brother thought she was a nerd, but her parents and teachers were proud of her. on the other hand, her brother started out as the class clown type and over time morphed into the kind of person who made trouble at school on purpose. this always reflected back on ava and made her feel like she had to be responsible for his actions.

ava started college at cal state bakersfield, intending to major in biochemistry and potentially go on to medical school. she wasn't a partier, she was an introvert with a small group of mostly studious friends, but some theater students as well. it was during college when she watched the stab movies for the first time. she'd been avoiding them for most of her life. she hated them, hated how their made her mom miserable. she wasn't keen on telling people that her uncle was one of the original too killers.

when she was 19, her parents finally divorced after being 'separated' for 6 months. vince took it harder than ava did. she was able to see that neither of her parents were happy with each other, but vince felt betrayed. they split custody of vince which drove him nuts, seeing as he wanted to stay with his dad full time. his dad worked though and leslie still had to find her footing as a single woman. ava stayed with her mom during breaks and summers, seeing as she was an adult in her first year of college. ava also encouraged her mom to go to therapy. 

after graduating from bakersfield, ava began grad school at reed college. academics really was her safe space and she always wanted to push herself to learn more and make the world better.

in 2021, her brother was the first victim of the killings going after descendants of the original woodsboro victims and killers. ava attended his funeral with her mom and dad.