Kindness, Caring and Strong Relationships Connections are the Key to Ending School Violence

Achieving Kids

Our Subject for today’s podcast falls on the heels of the latest school shooting. In Wylie ISD, we have a standard that every student have at least one positive relationship with an adult as a method of engaging kids and deterring acts of violence. Most students who commit these acts are isolated individuals without connection or support. By engaging our kids with kindness, caring and love will give them the hope and happiness necessary to thrive in a positive way. In Wylie, we actually measure student/teacher relationships 3 times per year to identify and help those who feel isolated. Our focus today is to learn about the value of caring, kindness and engagement and reflect on one parent’s experience of losing a child to an incident like what happened in Florida. Darrell Scott, parent of Rachel Scott and is the founder of Rachel’s Challenge. Rachel was a victim of the Columbine School Shooting in 1999. In Rachel’s diary, she wrote "I have this theory that if one person can go out of their way to show compassion, then it will start a chain reaction of the same. People will never know how far a little kindness can go." Darrell’s life has been dedicated to Rachel’s Challenge to bring kindness and caring to the world in a chain reaction that has touched over 5,000,000 lives. Episode guests: Darrell Scott, father of Rachel Scott, founder of Rachel's Challenge Mike Williams, principal of Wylie East High School Virdie Montgomery, principal of Wylie High School Barbara Goss, Wylie ISD parent, Board Member Heather Leggett, Wylie ISD parent, Board Member Ian Halperin, Executive Director of Public Relations For the Love & Logic parent resource referrenced by Mr. Scott, please click here: https://www.loveandlogic.com/ For the 180 Connections resource referrenced by Mr. Scott, please click here: https://goo.gl/mTxvk6 Information and advice contained in this podcast should not be used in any legal capacity whatsoever, including but not limited to defining, interpreting or establishing policies or procedures of a school or the district. No guarantee is given regarding the accuracy of any statements or opinions made on the podcast. Wylie ISD does not endorse any of the products or services referenced and guests on this podcast are not compensated.