Brandy Myatt | Delta Digital News Service

Westside Survivors Gather Journals

Posted on March 16, 2018 by Seth Cleveland

Flowers on marker at Westside Middle School Memorial Garden

by Seth Cleveland
Delta Digital News Service

JONESBORO — For one group of people in Jonesboro, the past 20 years remains a time of healing from wounds that never seem to close.

Valerie Grass (photo by Seth Cleveland)

By all accounts, March 24, 1998 began as a pretty average day. The students of Westside Middle School started fifth period. The teachers began the lesson. Then two middle-school students pulled the fire alarm, went up on a hill and began shooting, killing four students and a teacher, and wounding 10 more.

“No time for questions. It was just run and take cover,” said Valerie Grass, a student at Westside at the time of the shooting.

Brandy Myatt said she remembers hearing, “Don’t walk, run!” on that day.

“We just took off helter-skelter, and right as soon as we got to the gym, I noticed my friend holding her arm,” she said.

Brandy Myatt (photo by Seth Cleveland)

Myatt started piecing together what happened. And, she said, things began to change. From there began a long and arduous healing process.

That’s the truth for many people who have experienced similar events. Those who have experienced these atrocities must learn to move on.

The Westside survivors want to aid in the healing process of other survivors.

“We usually try to offer something to say, ‘You’re not alone in this,'” Myatt said.

After every school shooting since 1998, the Westside survivors have gotten together and figured out a way to help. After the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, the Westside survivors sent the children stuffed animals like they received. In other cases, the Westside survivors have gone to school to talk to the students.

For many of the Westside shooting survivors, Parkland felt different. The similarities between the shootings, the approaching 20-year anniversary and the helplessness — it all opened the wounds of the past.

“This most recent shooting has just flooded so many memories back,” Grass said.

Others in the group agreed.

“As soon as we heard about Parkland, we all got on our Facebook group … and the first thing that I asked is ‘What are we going to do?'” Myatt said.

Myatt’s journal (click photo to enlarge)

Their idea stemmed from something the survivors did after the shooting.

Ferncliff, a camp in Little Rock, offered the survivors a getaway from the media coverage the summer after the shooting. The survivors learned journaling as a way to cope.

“From that came a lot of healing,” Grass said. “When we got there they had a starter backpack with a flashlight, a journal and a teddy bear.”

Jennifer Roshto, a Westside survivor, appreciated the journals.

Jennifer Roshto (photo by Seth Cleveland)

“It gave me a place to say all these things and put all these things down, without having somebody tell me, ‘Well, you need to get over it,'” she said.

The Westside survivors want to gather 3,400 journals to send to Parkland survivors so that every high school student can have one.

“We’ve had several donations already, but I still feel that we’re very shy of what we need,” Roshto said.

Northeast Arkansas residents can donate until April 1 at several Journal Donation Locations around Jonesboro.

They also offer up their advice. “Take it day by day,” Myatt said.

Journal Donation Locations
Target	Monday – Friday, 8 a.m.- 4 p.m.	Brandy Myatt
VA Clinic	Monday – Friday, 8 a.m.- 4:30 p.m.	Lindsay Kifer
Hytrol	Monday – Friday, 8 a.m.- 4 p.m.	Jessica Odom
Westside Middle School
Pocahontas Schools
Highland Schools
Bono City Hall
Lost Pizza Company

Special Topic

Remembering the Westside Middle School Tragedy

Posted on March 16, 2018 by Miranda Reynolds

Sculpted sundial by Curtis Steele at Westside Middle School Memorial Garden

by Miranda Reynolds
Delta Digital News Service

JONESBORO – School shootings continue to bombard America; for some schools, it serves as a reminder of the past.

Westside Middle School experienced a school shooting March 24, 1998. This month marks the 20-year anniversary of the tragedy that killed five people.

Natalie Brooks, 11
Paige Herring, 12
Stephanie Johnson, 12
Brittheny Varner, 11
Shannon Williams Wright

The anniversary of the shooting remained in the Westside Consolidated School Board members’ thoughts in the February meeting. Vice President Darren Harpole addressed the board and audience with information regarding the Florida school shooting.

“We are working on this as a district. Our security team, we looked over our procedures. We talked about ways we can tighten stuff up so that we don’t leave anything out there,” Harpole said.

In further discussion of the topic, Harpole said the school strives to keep students safe.

Brandy Myatt, a student of Westside Middle School at the time of the shooting, remembers the day vividly.

She said talking her experiences through with friends and family proved to be difficult.

“With them not being there that day, they honestly don’t understand fully what we were going through,” Myatt said.

Myatt did not begin coping with the experience until the following summer.

Myatt does not support guns in school as a protection of students.

She said many ways exist to help those trying to coping.

“Take their time. Don’t rush the healing process, honestly. That’s where the ‘take their time’ comes in. Talk it out, if they can. If they can’t talk to their parents, then talk to their peers. If they can’t talk to their peers, then seek help. Get help any way that they can,” Myatt said.

Listen to more of Myatt’s interview with Miranda A Reynolds

Richard Carvell, retired department chair of Arkansas State University’s Radio and TV Department, worked from 1971 to 2008 in various positions. Carvell and his students stayed very hands on during the Westside Middle School shooting media coverage.

One of the more vivid memories Carvell explained dealt with the aftermath of the shooting.

As school shootings continue to occur, Carvell said he reacts in three ways.

“Of course I’m saddened at the loss of life and then I get angry. I think to myself and sometimes I say out loud, ‘Why aren’t we doing something to help the people who are going off the deep end and take out their frustration?’ We just don’t know enough to help those with mental problems,” Carvell said.

Listen to more of Carvell’s interview with Miranda Reynolds.