In October of 2022, a student and a teacher at Central Visual and Performing Arts High School were tragically killed when a shooter opened fire on the school. In the wake of such acts of violence, family, friends and community members often want to know how to show support for survivors.
Stephanie Malia Krauss is a social worker whose godson was at CVPA that day. She wrote a post on scarymommy.com called "Here's what I've learned about supporting someone after a school shooting." It includes ten do's and don'ts for how to show support.
Krauss told Total Information AM that one of the things she'd learned is that if you're supporting a friend or family member, it's important to get accurate information.
"With any kind of trauma or accident, grief or loss, everyone wants information. And very often our filters are off with who we ask for that information," she said. "I was inundated with text messages and phone calls asking for information. And immediately press and news were also contacting wanting interviews and wanting conversations. It was not only a moment of shock, but suddenly a moment to manage communication and correspondence to figure out what information to relay."
Another thing that can be surprisingly complicated, she said, is raising money through services like GoFundMe. Krauss and her sister set up a fundraiser online for her godson who had been shot. By the end of the week, that GoFundMe had raised more than $180,000.
"So then, two things happen. To be honest, the first thing was that a group of survivors started to contact us and say, 'We want to prepare you; people are going to be highly opinionated about this money. And it's not even enough to begin to cover the costs,'" Krauss said.
She added that not all the messages were positive. "Some were just angry that he would have gotten money, and that others wouldn't," she said. "My sister is a Black woman. She's also well employed, has insurance, pays her bills, owns her home. And there were incredible sentiments that were harsh and racist, and sexist about what she would do with the money."
Krauss told KMOX about what else she'd learned in the wake of the CVPA shooting, as well as her new book coming out in May. Listen to her full conversation here:
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