Lowell Sun, May 9, 2008
By Dennis Shaughnessey, dshaughnessey@lowellsun.com

TYNGSBORO — To the world, Rachel Scott is a tragic statistic: the first of 12 students and one teacher gunned down at Columbine High School nine years ago.
To Larry Scott, her uncle, she is so much more.

Rachel’s message of kindness and tolerance is the inspiration behind Rachel’s Challenge, a nonprofit, anti-violence program that is sprouting branches in high schools across the country. Using Rachel’s own writings, the nationwide program works to help students, parents and community leaders make changes to prevent more tragedies.

Speaking to a packed room of school administrators, teachers and law-enforcement officials at the Boston University Corporate Education Center yesterday, Scott recounted the events of April 20, 1999, when two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, emerged from behind a small hill, wearing leather trenchcoats and carrying an array of weapons.

“For the next 22 minutes, it was pure horror,” said Scott, who lives a mile away from the school in Littleton, Colo., and whose two children were students there that day. “It all goes back to the human heart. We want to change everything in the world, but we forget about the human heart.”

For more than 90 minutes, through videos, photos and his own powerful words, Scott told of the carnage that took place that day in one of the deadliest high-school shootings in the country’s history.

Tears ran down many cheeks — including those of veteran law-enforcement officials — as the compelling footage and personal interviews streamed across a big screen.

Rachel was sitting outside at a picnic table near the west entrance of the school when Harris and Klebold opened fire. She was shot four times and died instantly. Richard Castaldo was sitting with Rachel. He was hit eight times but survived. Rachel’s younger brother, Craig, was in the school library as the rampage continued. In the video, Craig Scott describes how he hid under a table with two friends, Matthew Kechter and Isaiah Shoels. The killers unloaded on Kechter and Shoels.

“Literally seconds before they were going to pull the trigger on my nephew, the sprinkler system went off and they left the library. Otherwise, I would have lost a niece and a nephew that day,” Scott said.

In the weeks following the shootings, Rachel Scott’s family discovered diaries and journals written by her that confirmed what they already knew: She was a special young woman who possessed wisdom, charm and a compassion for those on the outer fringes of society. She wrote about a “Code of Life” that included the entry, “I have this theory that if one person can go out of their way to show compassion, then it will start a chain reaction.”

“Well, she did start a chain reaction,” Scott said, explaining how family and friends feel compelled to speak to others on Rachel’s behalf. “It’s our responsibility, each and every one of us here today, to make sure kids like themselves enough to make good choices.”
The video explains how several years after the tragedy, Rachel’s father, Darrell Scott, discovered a drawing on the back of a dresser that Rachel had drawn in crayon when she was a child. It was an outline of her hand, inside which was written, “This hand belongs to Rachel Joy Scott and will someday touch millions of people’s hearts.”

After the presentation, sponsored by the Middlesex Partnership for Youth and the Office of Middlesex District Attorney Gerry Leone, Theresa Rogers, principal at Lakeview Junior High School in Dracut, said, “This was one of the most moving things I have ever seen. Every parent and every student needs to see this.”

Courtney Downing, an eighth-grader at the Wynn Middle School in Tewksbury, has seen the video before and last year heard a presentation by Rachel Scott’s high-school friend, Nicole Nowlen.

“Rachel changed my life,” said Downing, who started a Rachel’s Club at her school and raised $3,683 for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. “I started telling everyone at Christmas not to buy me presents. I asked for money instead. I got a bunch of friends involved with Rachel’s Challenge and we raised the money.”

Leone said his office is working to help stem violence in schools.

“It used to be insults and fights when you and I were growing up,” he told the audience. “Now it’s the use of weapons, which causes us the most concern as it relates to conflict resolution among kids.”

To learn more about Rachel’s Challenge, visit www.rachelschallenge.com.