The Victims: Never Again

PHOTOGRAPH FOR TIME BY STEVE LISS
LANCE KIRKLIN: He took four shots from Klebold and one from Harris that mangled his jaw. But he hasn't given up shooting with his dad

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PHOTOGRAPH FOR TIME BY STEVE LISS

ADAM KECHTER: His older brother Matt used to play lineman for the football team. When Matt died, the team adopted Adam, 13. Two weeks ago, Columbine won the state football championship. Afterward the team presented Adam with the trophy

Students at Columbine don't want to wait that long. Eleven of them--their backgrounds as diverse as can be hoped for in this mostly white, Abercrombie and Fitch community--spend an hour one morning sitting around the conference table in the front office. They're brainstorming about what they've learned from their tragedy, and what they plan to do so that it never happens again. "I don't tease my friends as much as I used to," says freshman Kent Van Zant. "I try to be a lot nicer now to everybody."

Senior Joel Kuhns, who was in Harris' video class last year, says that this year, "a lot of seniors have been more open to people, even to underclassmen. This is the class that they're going to look at to see what happened afterward. I just think that's a huge responsibility for us, and we're doing a pretty good job of it." Adds Lindsey White, who serves in the senior senate: "There are still cliques. You're going to get that no matter what. But more people are willing to talk to other people they don't usually talk to."

All summer, principal Frank DeAngelis has been listening. He spent July and August serving on two school-safety task forces, reviewing everything from metal detectors to dress codes to having four or five armed officers patrol school grounds. "I'm not sure if that's the answer," says DeAngelis. "I think where money needs to be spent is educating our students about tolerance, about respecting one another, about communication." While Columbine High School did add an additional campus supervisor this year, along with 16 security cameras and a keyless entry system, DeAngelis is most proud of Columbine's efforts at prevention: the Links program that pairs upperclassmen with incoming freshmen; the emphasis on "zero tolerance" of threats and harassment; the hiring by the school district of Jackson Katz, a consultant who speaks to coaches and athletes about using their status to be role models, and the peer-counselor program, in which senior leaders can help identify students in need of support. At Columbine's opening-day rally in August, DeAngelis urged all students "who don't feel part of the Columbine family" to come to his office and let him know why.

In September a Columbine student expressed to victim parent Bob Curnow what many of her peers were feeling. "I just want everything to get back to normal," she said. Curnow told her: "I understand what you're feeling. But you need to know that normal, before April 20, will never occur to you again. You need to redefine what normal is with this event as part of your life." And so it is with everyone in this community, and maybe in the nation too. We suffer through tragedies, we grieve, and we try to learn.