However, former teacher and school counselor Peggy Sapphire of New Fairfield, Connecticut, thinks that, in many public schools, too many students are invisible. In all the afterthoughts of the tragic spate of public school killings during the last school year, none addresses the fact that public schools are not held responsible for truly knowing each and every student. The student killers, later identified by peers who knew all along of their depression and obsession with violence, were either distantly known or fully anonymous to school personnel. This is not a remarkable phenomena. The organizing principles of public schools say nothing about their responsibility to truly know each and every student in their charge.
Schools are society - a child's society.
Public schools are the single community institution mandated to receive each and every child within its borders-every immigrant and foster child, every learning, physically and emotionally disabled child, every abused and substance abusing child, every neglected, impoverished and undernourished child, children of barely coping parents, children of unemployed, emotionally absent parents, children from any and all combinations and permutations such as these. The public in public schools must insist on redefinition and unprecedented commitment that all students will be truly known within their schools. This is not a guarantee of the end of violence. But we can expect that a student's anonymous alienation, which breeds rage and violence, can be stemmed by reliable relationships with support personnel who truly know all students. Such relationships would develop as integral to the educational process, with support personnel exercising their expertise and advocacy skills.