Making Sense

“...we are family, we are made for togetherness, for goodness, and for compassion.”?

- Desmond Tutu, Cleric and Activist

The tragedy at The Covenant School has touched us all. As I sit down to write, my hands hovering over the keyboard, it’s hard to know where to start because the topic is senseless and unexplainable. It is also hard to know when to finish because there are not enough words or combinations of words to pay homage to the victims.

Personally, Katherine Koonce was a professional acquaintance of mine that I got to know and deeply respect. In the final moments of her life, she displayed courage worthy of a saint. It also seems clear now that many teachers and staff members, fortified by solid training, acted in a manner that likely saved many lives.

There are many connections to The Covenant School in our community; through family, church, as friends, neighbors, and former colleagues. With the tragedy occurring so close to us, the fear is inescapable. However, how our staff, students, parents, and trustees rallied says everything you need to know about their character and commitment.?

My sincere thanks to those in our community who have reached out in support and helped in some way. I have also had many inquiries about what we do and what we could do. After the Board and the leadership team thoroughly vet options, we will discuss mitigation, and additional measures will be implemented. And, yes, there will be enhancements. Having gone through similar processes at two previous schools, you realize that hundreds of options are possible, and we will determine the best fit for our culture and community.

In some recent communications, speculation that Currey Ingram might be more susceptible to such acts because of the profile of our students has been raised. I am a rational and logical thinker, sometimes to a fault, just ask my wife and children. So I acknowledge the point. While students with moderate-to-severe emotional problems do not fit our mission, we do have students with a greater range of emotional challenges due to their learning difference. Because of this and the significant social-emotional development adolescents experience with or without a learning difference factored in, we prioritize social-emotional learning through intentional programs, like our RULER program.

I also reviewed the statistics regarding school mass shootings over the past 23 years, since Columbine.? There have been 304 shootings at schools , with 392 people killed and 1,119 injured in K-12 alone. Fifteen mass school shootings since Columbine have killed 175 people in K-12 schools and colleges.

As far as I could tell, none occurred in an LD school similar to Currey Ingram Academy. They all seem to have occurred in more typical school environments. But this is no guarantee; unfortunately, we live in a world where we cannot promise no harm will come due to a random and senseless act. Although we will enhance and upgrade our security, we hope that one day more substantive society-wide solutions will be considered one day.

But here’s what we can control. We will continue to create opportunities to develop emotional resilience for those students that come to us emotionally fragile.

By academic progress made.

By building self-esteem.

By embracing and celebrating them.

By giving them a sense of control in their lives.

By developing a sense of purpose that leads to hope for the future.

We have endless data to support students making progress. We have countless testimonials from students and parents tearfully explaining the transformation. In their speeches at graduation and alumni years later, many seniors say, “Currey Ingram saved my life.”

So what I believe in my heart of hearts is that rather than adding risk to the world we live in, we are creating lives of purpose and meaning, and when people have purpose and meaning, they do not resort to meaningless and unfathomable acts.?

As my hands leave the keyboard, I’m not sure I made any more sense of this, but I do feel Desmond Tutu’s words are right for the Currey Ingram community, “we are family, we are made for togetherness, for goodness, and for compassion.”?

As always, and especially at this time, thank you for trusting us with your children, and know that my door is always open.