And that presentation was why she and dozens of her fellow high school students chose to be a part of the Friends of Rachel, a student group advised by guidance counselors Amanda Schur and Kira Murphy.
“It gave us a good opportunity to do something good for the schools, something small or something big, depending on what we make it,” said Coburn. “I think it’s a good opportunity to make the change we know we need in this school — just like the whole atmosphere itself.”
Rachel’s Challenge tells the story of Rachel Scott, the first student killed during the Columbine massacre in April 1999. Scott was known for the kindness she demonstrated at school, and her parents found the “Code of Ethics” she penned a month before her death. There are Friends of Rachel groups around the country that continue to spread the message the Rachel’s Challenge presentation starts.
Between 50 and 75 students attended the first meeting of Fairfield’s Friends of Rachel this past September, said Schur and Murphy.
“The idea is to do Friends of Rachel to keep it (Rachel’s Challenge) going,” Murphy said. “It’s not like it’s this one-time event, but there’s actual follow through of doing stuff, empowering kids to do stuff after Rachel’s Challenge.”
Coburn said Rachel Scott “was meant for something” and together the Fairfield group can band together for the common goal of making their corner of the world a kinder, more positive place to be.
“This whole thing was meant to carry (her message) out for her all over the country,” she said.
For junior Kennedy Johnstone, 16, the message and the Friends of Rachel will make them better people and leaders.
“Next year, we’re going to be seniors, and we’re going to be the role models, and people are going to be looking up to us,” she said. “If they see us doing these things, then we’re hoping that will carry on and then (the next class) will do them — and it will just keep going and going.”
Focusing on the positive can make the Friends of Rachel a force to “bring a culture of kindness” to the Fairfield student body, said Nsisong Udosen, a 17-year-old senior.
“We’re the biggest force that can stop bullying,” said the student body president. “It’s classmates looking out for each other.”
This is done not by focusing on diminishing hate, the students say.
Instead, “we want to focus on the love and kindness,” Udosen said, noting will fade as a result.
“I wanted to change the culture of our school and make it a better place for us to learn,” said Udosen. “We can feel a disconnect (to the world) because we are such a big school.”
When school resumes in January, following the winter break, the Friends of Rachel will charge forward with three ideas the group developed:
- New student services: a new student is assigned to a current student "to be a friend" and support them on their first day. More than 200 news students had entered the school system before the end of winter break, and that's an average year. Hundreds of new students come into the district for a variety of reasons, including transferring schools or leaving a private school.
- Project Post-it: positive messages will be posted to various lockers and in different areas of the school that provide positive words of encouragement, and it can be directed at specific students or just general messages of inspiration and comfort.
- Locker letters: positive, kind letters will be slipped into everyone's locker at some point during the school year.
“I think it’s making people feel that people notice them, and that they matter and that people care about them,” said Schur about the projects.
And more importantly, “it’s the general feeling of positivity that we want to keep going, to remind people about Rachel’s Challenge,” Murphy said.
After Rachel’s Challenge, Johnstone said she had seen a change in how it affected people. She said, “it shocked people.”
“I didn’t know about the whole Columbine shooting, and I didn’t know about Rachel either, and I think it really informed them and opened their eyes that this is real, and we need to make this a better community and a better school by spreading this happiness.”
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