To the Editor:
I would like to thank former principal and current school safety consultant Bill Bond for the work he does (“Safety Expert Shares Hard-Won Wisdom,” May 11, 2005.) I would also like to thank him for visiting Lame Deer High School in Lame Deer, Mont., and presenting his powerful story, which was conveyed in your front-page article. Mr. Bond’s presence and his story of coping, eight years ago, with the fatal shootings of three students at his high school in West Paducah, Ky., had a great impact on our students and staff members.
It is a terrible event to relive and relive, yet his willingness to do so means a lot for those still confronting similar pressures today. Our students face many of the same daily hardships experienced by the students in Red Lake, Minn., the site of a fatal school shooting this year. All of us must continue to pray and work at providing our young people with some type of peace in their lives.
Peter O. Gonder
Drug and Alcohol Counselor
Lame Deer High School
Lame Deer, Mont.
