“I promise to do all I can to protect children from gun violence by encouraging and supporting solutions that create safer, healthier homes, schools and communities ”
– The Sandy Hook Promise
Sandy Hook Promise released the following Public Service Announcement from the vantage point of a student shooter. While this is difficult to watch, the final moment is the most chilling. Listen to the words he utters, “Look at me!”, he screams, “Look at me!”
Mark Barden, one of the founders of Sandy Hook Promise, lost his son Daniel in the massacre. Most of the victims were six or seven years old, compounding the horror and senseless loss of life. In a recent article, Mark wrote:
If we are defined by our actions, then the person that shot and killed 26 innocent people in our son’s school is the incarnation of pure evil, plain and simple. Except I’m not buying it. I am convinced that what happened at Sandy Hook Elementary that cold morning was the culmination of years of bad choices, negligence, and overlooked signs, such as social isolation and a fascination with mass violence…
…What I’ve discovered is that asking who is fundamentally bad doesn’t do much good. It’s much more important to focus on what you can see, what you can prevent, and those things that empower students– the eyes and ears of their schools — to look for warning signs…
By empowering our children with simple, human-centered tools, we can teach our children and ourselves to ask a better question: How do we keep each other safe?
How do we keep each other safe? That is where research efforts may have the most impact. Safety and security are basic human needs, coming after food, water and rest, according to Psychologist, Dr. Abraham Maslow:
Belongingness comes next in the Pyramid that Maslow introduced to the world in 1943 in his ground-breaking, and still relevant “Theory of Motivation”. Social isolation and the feeling of loneliness has been an ever-growing public health concern. Could understanding student isolation and loneliness be the next frontier to promote school safety? I will continue to focus on the question posed by Daniel’s dad, Mark Barden:
By empowering our children with simple, human-centered tools, we can teach our children and ourselves to ask a better question: How do we keep each other safe?