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Newsletter | November 29, 2000 Although the reports of new pledge counts have slowed down since last month, each day brings additional tallies. Our current total is 2,421,539 - already 400,000 more than last year's. [2,432,337 as of 01/22/01] Even more gratifying than the large numbers have been the anecdotes and letters that have been coming in. What follows will be a discussion of next year's date, our hopes for next year, some wonderful anecdotes from this year's observance, and an update on all the networks that worked to make this year's Day of Concern the most successful ever. At the very end is a reference to the latest figures on firearm deaths among young people. Therefore, although I apologize for the length of this newsletter, I urge you to read on! NEXT YEAR'S DATE AND REQUEST FOR FEEDBACK Many of you expressed the hope that we could keep the Day of National Concern within the National School Safety Week, which also coincides with the Y's Week Without Violence. The only drawback to activities scheduled during this particular week is that many states' teachers' associations also have statewide meetings at that time. We have found that most of those meetings take place on the last two days of the week, however. Another conflict during that week is with PSATs, scheduled on Tuesday, October 16. That leaves us with Wednesday the 17th of October if we do wish to remain within that week. We are already receiving inquiries about next year's date, so I would be grateful for your feedback before we print up next year's materials. We are grateful for the photos, news clippings, and anecdotes that you have sent. Please, if you have clippings, videotape, or stories of your events, do share them with us! HOPES FOR NEXT YEAR As gratifying as it has been to know that the Student Pledge has reached millions of young people in the country, our original hope and vision was that it would literally blanket the country, including young people in every large city and small town across the US. Clearly, the bigger it gets, the more effective the observance becomes in underscoring the power that young people have when they come together and speak with a collective voice. We have a long way to go before it gets everyplace. We would like to identify a student leader/spokesperson for the Pledge drive in each state. We would like to identify additional city and state point people. I would like to put the Pledge on sounder financial footing. (If you know of corporations that might be interested in long-term sponsorship of the Student Pledge, please let me know.) ANECDOTES Young people and their teachers demonstrated some remarkable creativity in making this year's Day of National Concern about Young People and Gun Violence effective and meaningful. Among the memorable anecdotes: A high school whose student body included a number of gang members devoted an entire day to the Day of National Concern. Walls in the high school displayed large tear drops with names of young people who had been shot, and an all-school assembly featured speakers who had been directly affected by gun violence. One of the speakers was a woman whose husband had been killed in a mass shooting and whose son was severely injured in the same incident. A young man and former gang member, now paraplegic as a result of gunshot, also spoke about the long-term consequences of trying to solve problems with guns. After the assembly, the principal noticed that many of her toughest students lingered in the hallways, seeming to want to talk to the young man in the wheelchair. She arranged for an empty classroom to serve as a meeting place for those wishing to talk privately with the young man. At the end of the day, several male students asked if they could speak with her. She met them in the parking lot so they wouldn't be overheard. What they wanted to discuss ñ with her and with the former gang member ñ was how they could leave their gang and turn their lives around. For this principal and for those of us coordinating the Day of National Concern, this one school alone made the whole national observance seem worthwhile. ****** The students of a suburban Detroit school invited 200 city school children to join them for Day of Concern activities. All day, the elementary-aged children from the two schools went from work station to work station, creating art and dramatic presentations and listening to stories ñ all stressing non-violence. At the end of the day, the children formed a human chain, joining hands to say the Pledge together, adding their collective oral pledge to the written pledges they had signed earlier. We heard about the father of one of the Detroit students ñ a man who worked two jobs and got a short night's sleep even on the best of days ñ rearranged his schedule for the day and rode two buses so that he could be with his child for the Day of Concern activities. He felt that his child's participation was so important that he wanted to be there to support her. ****** A school safety officer wrote us a wonderful long letter describing what he and his students had done on October 17. The students, each carrying a t-shirt with the name of a young person who had died from gunshot, marched to their town's square where townspeople had been invited to witness the collective saying of the Pledge. (More and more frequently, we are hearing about schools that invite witnesses to the signing or saying of the Pledge. At St. Mary, Star of the Sea in Chicago, Chicago City Council members have been invited for two years in a row to visit classrooms while students engage in Pledge and Day of Concern activities. As Maureen McVey, one of the organizers of the event there, says: "It gives weight and seriousness to the commitment the students are making if local dignitaries care enough to observe and applaud.") ****** In Alabama, a teacher wishing to invite to her school someone who had experienced loss due to gun violence had the following idea: She thought that surely local television news reporters covered many stories about gunshot victims and might have a number of eyewitness stories to tell. She approached one of her city's local television stations and asked if any of their reporters would be willing to come to her school as a speaker on the Day of Concern. Apparently, the problem the station had in meeting her request was not that no one was willing but that seven reporters vied with each other for the opportunity. It was finally decided that a reporter who, in addition to having covered many gun-related stories, had lost a relative to gun violence would be the most appropriate guest from the station. (Please note: This is a great idea for getting both speakers and publicity for next year.) The same Alabama teacher who thought of inviting a news reporter as a speaker told me of another idea she had implemented in her school. As a lead-in to the Day of Concern, she bought multi-colored threads for making friendship bracelets. She got enough for every student and staff member in the school to make a bracelet. She set up the project so that the bracelets could only be made in twos. Every teacher, administrator, and custodian went to a classroom and took part. The message of the exercise was that the multi-colored threads reflected the diversity of their school's population; the weaving together of the threads into friendship bracelets reflected the fact that they were all inextricably linked and the well-being of one mattered to the whole. The whole school began building towards the Day of Concern for the entire preceding week. ****** A school guidance counselor told us that she met with each homeroom classroom for one hour the week before the Day of Concern. She talked with each group about issues of violence, conflict resolution, and what to do if confronted with a situation involving a gun. She was very gratified a week or so after October 17 to learn about a student in her school who had gone camping with her family and a friend. The girl and her friend had gone for a walk in the woods and come across a gun. The friend (not a student in the school) had suggested that they pick up the gun and take it to someone. The girl said no, that she had learned that young people weren't supposed to do that ñ that they needed to go and tell her father. The father returned to the spot where the girls had spotted the gun and said that he was going to take it and dispose of it in some appropriate way. The girl didn't want her father to do that and suggested, instead, that they call the police and get them to deal with it. Which is what they did. ****** A school in Tucson broke their Day of Concern observance into three parts. 1) The day before, the school hosted an open house for parents that displayed a poster blow-up of the Pledge. The parents were asked to sign onto the principles of the Pledge as a prelude to dialogue about issues of guns and violence with their children. 2) The school's guidance counselor presented a lesson about gun violence prevention to every classroom in the school. 3) The counselor organized a school-wide walk up a nearby mountain. At the top, the students formed a circle, made peace offerings, and read poems. As they looked down on the city below, the students talked about the fact that it was their community and there were things they personally could do to make it stronger and better. Some parents also joined the walk. And so on! ACTIVE NETWORKS Some new networks became involved in disseminating information about this year's Student Pledge, and many existing partnerships were strengthened. Thanks to Governor Christine Todd Whitman's leadership in contacting all of her fellow state governors, we heard from at least one quarter of the country's governors ñ either through the proclamations they sent us or through state offices whose help was enlisted through their governor's office. Mayor Sharon Sayles Belton of Minneapolis was generous in reaching out yet again to her mayoral colleagues in the U.S. Conference of Mayors and we heard about a number of mayors who lent their support to this year's Student Pledge drive thanks to the alert from Mayor Sayles Belton. Chicago's Police Chief, Superintendent Terry Hillard, wrote to all of the major city chiefs, telling them about his department's leadership and activities in Chicago's Day of Concern activities. This year, Superintendent Hillard and Commander Roberta Bartik and Investigator Connie Perusich of the Youth Investigative Services were able to engage the help of Chicago White Sox superstar, Frank Thomas, "the Big Hurt." Thomas recorded a segment for use in WBBM-96's annual Day of Concern radio broadcast; he videotaped a message for young people about not letting gun violence spoil their dreams; and he posed for pictures with students wearing Pledge t-shirts. We know that Superintendent Hillard's colleagues heeded his call for support of the Day of Concern because we heard from many of them. In several cities, the police department and its safety officers played a significant leadership role. Although we received help last year from the network of U.S. Attorneys, the help this year was even more significant. Minnesota's US Attorney, Todd Jones, took the lead this year as well as last in spreading awareness about the Day of Concern with his counterparts. His staff prepared a truly wonderful packet of materials which they mailed to every Student Council in Minnesota. The materials contained templates for posters and banners, sample press releases, event planning suggestions, and camera-ready graphics. The event-planning packet developed by Jones's staff provided a valuable tool for the many students who, increasingly, are taking the leadership role in coordinating Pledge drives in their schools. Some of the strongest efforts in other parts of the country derived from responses in the US Attorney network. In the Middle District of Florida, for example, the US Attorney's office worked actively to disseminate the Student Pledge with the Florida Crime Prevention Association, the Florida Regional Community Policing Institute, 300 chiefs, sheriffs, and state and federal law enforcement executives, 35 school superintendents, and all of the community policing officers who have taken classes at the Florida Regional Community Policing Institute. All of their Weed & Seed sites were urged to participate and given materials as well. This ambitious partnership effort, led by Donna Schulz in middle Florida, demonstrates very well the kinds of collaborative efforts that the Student Pledge engenders or fits into. Several state legislators took an active role in promoting the Pledge in their states. Senator Cheryl Jacques of Massachusetts wrote to all of the superintendents in her district, urging them to involve their schools, and she also wrote to her fellow Massachusetts legislators urging them to do the same. Senator Lois Frankel of Florida took an equally active role with her colleagues and in her district. With their help, we hope to encourage state legislators in other states to follow suite next year. A number of Safe and Drug-free Schools networks, both on the city, state, and national levels, made information available about the Student Pledge, and we were grateful for their help as well. The web broadcast, Teenwebtalk.com, worked with the Student Pledge this year to create an eight-hour interactive program on the Day of National Concern. Students from all over the country were invited to record messages beforehand that could be read on the 17th, or they could call in live that day. Several school assemblies were broadcast in their entirety, and we understand that highlights of the day's broadcast will be archived so that visitors to the site will be able to hear them. Finally, and very importantly, we worked in closer partnership than ever with the educational associations that have been working with the Student Pledge: the National Association of Student Councils, the National School Boards Association, the American Federation of Teachers, the National PTA, the National Association of Secondary School Principals, the NEA, and so on. There are wonderful people in these organizations who really care about the health and well-being of young people, and it is a privilege to work with them on our common goals. OTHER NOTABLE NEWS As many of you know, I have been disappointed in the past that the national media hasn't picked up on the fact that millions of young people over the last five years have taken an active stance against gun violence and are determining to let their voices count. But this year, as in previous years, we know that there was lots of local press coverage for Pledge events; both in the print media and on local television stations. And Vince Villegas, the high school senior who coordinated Michigan's Pledge drive, appeared on the Rosie O'Donnell Show on October 17 to talk about the Student Pledge. (He did a terrific job and we got a large number of e-mails in response to that appearance!!) Once again, Family Circle Magazine did a nice piece on the Pledge in one of their fall issues. Some states that have not had a lot of Pledge activity in the past surpassed all expectations this year. Thanks to the inspired leadership of Rosemary Miller and the involvement of Bell South Pioneers who made the Student Pledge a statewide project, South Carolina blanketed the state with pledges, secured the help and cooperation of state leaders such as Governor Jim Hodges, and reported more than 161,000 pledges statewide! Thanks to the help of the Safe Schools, Safe Communities network, we had wider participation in Arizona than ever before. And so on. Once again, we saw the power of professional athletes as potential role models. The Minnesota Timberwolves again helped to spread the message "Shoot Hoops ñ Not Each Other: Sign the Pledge" through eight Twin Cities billboards and on posters featuring Kevin Garnett on all Metro Transit buses and sent to every school in Minnesota. We hope that the participation of superstars such as Frank Thomas and Kevin Garnett will inspire other sports heroes to help spread the Pledge's life-saving message. And, most of all, we hope that superstars like these will continue to help emphasize that it's not cool to solve life's problems with gun violence. THANKS! Mainly, I want to thank all of you who have been part of the effort to empower the millions of students who have taken part in the Student Pledge Against Gun Violence. It's hard from our own little vantage points to know whether our own local efforts do, indeed, add up and promote change. My sense, from where I sit, is that you/we are making a difference. When the Centers for Disease Control and the National Center for Health Statistics published this year's death rates, reporting a 35% drop in firearm deaths among young people since 1995, it was gratifying to read that one of the report's authors attributed the drop in youth firearm deaths, at least in part, to "heightened awareness." I think we can all know that our efforts have been part of that "heightened awareness." Good job! Please let us know of any changes in your contact information: e-mail address, job, or phone number. And if you know of others who might want to receive our newsletter, please let us know about them. Warm wishes for the holidays, Mary Lewis Grow, National Coordinator