One year later: Springfield is still working to overcome tragedy
On May 21,1998,
Springfield experi
enced a 57-minute
emergency incident
that turned into a multi-week
media event watched around the
world.
Today, Springfield marks the
one-year anniversary of the tragic
shooting at Thurston High
School.
Tonight, many of us will come
together in a Community Gather
ing for Remembrance and Re
newal. We’ll remember Bill and
Faith Kinkel and Mikael and
Ben, the four people who lost
their lives, and we will think
about how that senseless act
changed us all forever.
But we’ll do more tonight than
remember our lost loved ones
and seek relief from the pain of
the last year. When we gather,
we’ll find the strength and re
newal that emerges each time our
community comes together.
We’ll renew our determination
not to succumb to the hopeless
ness that can be overwhelming in
the face of an act of violence so
severe it numbs the senses. And
we will celebrate what we have
learned about ourselves and our
community since May 21,1998.
Last year,
when we were COTYlTYWYlUtty
Maureen
Maine
faced with the
unthinkable,
literally
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community members closed
ranks around Springfield. City
employees worked around the
clock, volunteers organized a
candlelight vigil and members of
the faith community sponsored a
service at the high school.
Still other volunteers coun
seled distraught children and
parents, helped at an assistance
center opened at the high school
and lent their professional skills
to manage close to $500,000 in
spontaneous offers of financial
assistance.
Our extraordinary ability to
come together in a crisis could be
seen all over the world in the
seamless way we responded to
not one but two crime scenes
(one the largest in Springfield’s
history). We interviewed more
than 250 eyewitnesses in the first
24 hours, managed a virtual inva
sion by hundreds of news re
porters, and even responded
with concrete written proposals
when asked by the White House
and our federal delegation what
the government can do to help
prevent school violence.
As the days wore on and the
lives of Springfield residents be
came the subject of relentless
news broadcasts, we realized we
were subject to a feeling of hope
lessness. We faced the enormity
and complexity of the issues af
fecting every community in the
United States: deteriorating fami
ly values, access to guns, reduced
resources for schools and recre
ation programs and violence in
the media and video games. We
struggled with feelings of help
lessness against such odds.
But we organized a communi
ty forum just 10 days after the
shooting and invited federal,
state and local elected officials to
join us in listening. Dozens of
Springfield residents cared
enough to attend and wait pa
tiently for their turn at the micro
phones.
We narrowed and prioritized
the list of ideas in a second com
munity forum and then present
ed that information to those
working on a Community Action
Plan for Youth and Families in
Springfield. Copies of the draft
plan will be on hand at the open
house this evening.
Tonight, together, we will
think about what we’ve learned
in the last year:
■ That in the face of horrible,
horrible tragedy, Springfield
moves swiftly to respond to the
needs of the community with a
gentleness and attention to detail
more characteristic of family tak
ing care of family.
■ That we value our partner
ships with Eugene and Lane
County and other public and pri
vate organizations, and we work
those relationships everyday be
cause it’s a way of life for us and
because we re all in this together.
■ That sadly, Springfield is not
unique in experiencing the hor
ror of school violence, and its
randomness is humbling.
■ Finally, that each of us has
the power to do at least one thing
to make a difference in the lives
of youth and families, and that
this makes all the difference in
the world.
Maureen Maine is the Springfield
mayor.
Diversity
Continued from Paget A
es,” Bachelder said.
The University of Maryland, Harvard
University and the University of Kansas al
ready have diversity programs.
The University of Maryland at College
Park set up a Web site to catalog its efforts at
increasing diversity. University of Oregon
'President Dave Frohnmayer proposed a
similar Web site on Tuesday.
Student activists are also demanding the
administration create a position in Johnson
Hall with the express purpose of promoting
diversity.
Students and administrators formed oth
er joint committees to confront the issues
Wednesday.
“Johnson Hall is where the administra
tion is, and we need a voice in there,”
Bachelder said.
Robert Melnick, dean of the School of Ar
chitecture and Allied Arts and a member of
the committee, said he felt the process was
on the right track.
“There is a need for this to be inclusive,”
he said.
The planning, public policy and manage
ment class where the first remark and sexu
ally violent threats sparked the sit-in on
Tuesday met for another day of class —
closed to the media.
With a new class e-mail listserv re
tooled for added security and Lynn
Brown, an officer from the Office of Pub
lie Safety, watching the class, students
discussed what to do next.
“It is almost impossible to go from what
happened Tuesday and just jump back into
class,’1 said John Hibbard, one of the class’
two professors.
Convy, the student who reportedly e
mailed racist and sexual threats to several
female students in the class, is taking the
course by correspondence from home. Stu
dent Scott Bones made the intial comments
that were called racist, but he has apolo
gized to the class. Neither student could be
reached for comment.
One topic of concern in the class was the
faculty’s lack of diversity and diversity
awareness.
“How much do these issues of privi
lege affect our understanding of each oth
er?” asked student John Riordan. “We
need an enriched faculty community
which understands and doesn’t hide
from these issues.”
Elizabeth Rocha, the class’ other profes
sor, said she thought by next Tuesday the
class would be more focused on the cur
riculum, but she was critical of the current
University curriculum.
“The reason this exploded is because
many people go through four years in this
school never having to deal with issues of
race and gender,” she said. “That’s an in
dictment of the curriculum and that’s an in
dictment of the University.”
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