School Climate & Safety

Sandy Hook Promise Releases Chilling Warning About School Violence

By Evie Blad — December 10, 2018 | Updated: June 26, 2023 1 min read
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Updated: A previous version of this page included a video, which has since been removed.

Approaching the sixth anniversary of the day 26 people died in school shooting in Newtown, Conn., an organization started by some of the victims’ families has released a video it hopes will prevent similar acts of violence in the future.

Sandy Hook Promise produced the video, called “Point of View,” as part of an annual series of spots designed to educate students about warning signs that their classmates may harm themselves or others.

The organization has several programs that emphasize school-violence prevention, including clubs that teach students to “Say Something” about their concerns. After the February school shooting in Parkland, Fla., it launched a tipline that allows students to anonymously report a variety of safety and school climate issues, including violence.

The latest video pans through a typical high school leading up to a student council election. It is only at the end of the video that the viewer realizes the camera has taken the perspective of a socially isolated student who is prepared to act. A series of still photos from the video created by Sandy Hook Promise can be viewed alongside the video to show the warning signs a viewer may have missed, like a sense of rejection by classmates, a fascination with guns, and social media threats.

“More than 3,200 kids and teens have been killed or injured by guns and there have been over 300 mass shootings in just this one year. This is beyond unacceptable. It is inexcusable. Everyone has the power to stop violence before it starts, and we want to arm as many people as possible with the knowledge of how to keep their schools and communities safe,” said a statement by Nicole Hockley, co-founder and managing director of Sandy Hook Promise, whose son, Dylan, was killed in the Newtown shooting.

You can review the warning signs Sandy Hook Promise spotlights in the video on its website.

And you can learn more about Sandy Hook Promise in this piece Education Week produced for the PBS Newshour.


Related reading about school shootings, violence prevention:

A version of this news article first appeared in the Rules for Engagement blog.