Washington School District accepts Rachel?s Challenge

The Washington Junior High School witnessed a motivational, funny and often moving presentation Wednesday afternoon. The school invited speaker Chris Hall to talk about how to keep a positive outlook on life and about the importance of treating others with respect.

Hall spoke on behalf of an organization called ?Rachel?s Challenge.? It is named after Rachel Scott, a 17-year-old girl who was killed at the Columbine High School massacre in Littleton, Colo. in 1999. After the tragedy, her father Darrell Scott spoke around the country about the need for a more compassionate world. Darrell employed the writings and drawings from Rachel?s many diaries. Hall read some of her diary entries Wednesday. Several of the passages have become famous in television commercials.

Hall issued five challenges to the students. The first challenge was to ?treat others the way you want to be treated.? Hall showed the audience a video of a school near Dallas that was inspired by Rachel?s message. The school made paper chain links where each link represented an act of kindness. The school?s paper chain consisted of 123,000 links and was 3 ½ miles long.

In her diary, Rachel outlined her hands on the pages and then inside the outline wrote, ?These hands belong to Rachel Joy Scott and will someday touch millions of people?s hearts.?

Hall noted, ?Her dream has come true.?

The second challenge for the students was to dream ?big and believe in yourself.? Hall showed them a video of a boy standing on a baseball diamond alone with a bat and a bucket of balls. The boy proudly announces, ?I?m the greatest hitter in the world!? throws the ball in the air, and whiffs when he tries to hit it. ?Strike one,? he says. Twice more the boy swings and misses at the ball. Instead of becoming disillusioned with his hitting abilities, the boy jumps up and exclaims, ?I?m the greatest pitcher in the world!?

Hall?s third challenge is ?appreciate everyone, mock no one.? He asked the students how many of them had ever been mocked by a classmate. Everyone raised their hand.

Then he asked them, ?How many of you have mocked somebody else??

Once again, although this time with more hesitation, everyone raised their hand.

Hall said that one of Rachel?s deepest desires was to be remembered as a kind person, as someone who respected others.

?How do you want to be remembered?? he asked the students.

Hall urged the students to treat each other with respect at all times and not to be a fair-weather friend.

He read one of Rachel?s journal entries that has been quoted the world over, and that is, ?Don't let your character change color with your environment. Find out who you are and let it stay its true color."

Hall showed the students a video of Darrell Scott speaking about ?positive gossip.? Darrell told the story of two men from colonial times, Tom and John, who fought incessantly. They had a mutual friend named Ben. Whenever Ben was with Tom, he would tell Tom all the nice things John said about him, and likewise when Ben was with John. Ben just reported the uplifting comments one said about the other, and never shared the nasty insults he heard. Tom and John ended up being the best of friends, and wrote letters to one another in the last few years of their lives. The two died on exactly the same day ? July 4, 1826.

The characters in Darrell?s story were not fictitious but real. John was John Adams, the second president of the United States and Tom was Thomas Jefferson, the third president. Ben was Benjamin Rush, a Founding Father who attended the Continental Congress and signed the Declaration of Independence. Promoting positive gossip, the way Rush did, was Hall?s fourth challenge to the student body.

Hall?s fifth and final challenge was to forgive others and accept their forgiveness when they have done wrong. He showed the students another video, this time of Rachel?s brother Craig. Craig and Rachel got along very well. But the day Rachel was killed, the two got in a big argument on the way to school. Craig?s last memory of Rachel is slamming the car door behind her. Craig said in the video that it took him a long time to overcome the grief and remorse he felt from treating his sister that way on the last day of her life.