PERCEPTION and EXPERIENCE of DEATHS

My first email:

"Hello (Friend in Southwest),

How are your students and you coping with the tragedy?"

Reply:

"Funny, only one or two people mentioned it. Out here in (the Southwest) I think most people feel pretty removed from what's happening on the East Coast. I'm guessing it's a much bigger deal in New York City, much more up close and personal."

My second email:

"(Friend in Southeast), I wanted to check-in with you about how you and your students and community are doing in light of our recent tragedy? Hope you are all ok."

Reply:

"Thanks, for your concern about our students (and faculty, for that matter) after last Monday's events. I think every campus in the country is shaken up. There have been reports all week of people being arrested for threatening high school and college campi all over. It's sad that you can't enter the classroom now without fear that something like that might happen. So, we are all a little rattled, but life and learning go on. This is our last week of classes (and it's a partial week) before exams, so school is almost out for the year."

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I checked-in with two college professor friends of mine about how they, their students, and their communities were doing with regard to the Virginia Tech deaths, of one week ago. One friend teaches in the Southwest, the other in the Southeast. They shall remain anonymous as our exchanges were intended to be and remain personal -- "off the record." Also, this post is not about either of their personal views, but rather about the subject of: a PERCEPTION; and one's EXPERIENCE of that PERCEPTION. I want to explore how the same occurrence so often means something so very different to each of us.

Like I said, checking-in with my friends was personal, I was going to just leave it at that, especially given the sensitivity and sadness of the matter. Then today, I read this:

"Professor axed for VT stunt: Re-enacted tragedy to tout pro-gun perspective

By Casey Ross
Boston Herald Reporter
Saturday, April 21, 2007 - Updated: 01:00 PM EST

An Emmanuel College professor has been fired after re-enacting the Virginia Tech massacre in his classroom in order to air a pro-gun viewpoint that offended students at the Catholic liberal arts school, the professor charged yesterday.

Nicholas Winset said he was terminated and permanently barred from campus following a Wednesday lecture in which he dramatized the massacre to show that deranged gunman Cho Seung-Hui could have been stopped if another student had been carrying a gun."

Then I went to his YouTube posting and heard his point-of-view there: Fired Professor Speaks Out

Since honoring each person's EXPERIENCE of their PERCEPTION is so central to a Youand approach, I thought sharing these views might stimulate others to consider how what is so true to each us, is often so different to another person.

Sincerely,

José Angel Santana

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"The final frontier may be human relationships, one person to another." -- Buzz Aldrin, Astronaut