Here and Now
Madison Confronts the Enormity of the Abundant Life Shooting
Clip: Season 2300 Episode 2324 | 4m 17sVideo has Closed Captions
Educators and the Madison community grapple directly with an epidemic of violence.
Following the shooting at Abundant Life Christian School where a teacher and student were killed, educators and the broader Madison community grapple directly with a nationwide epidemic of violence.
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Here and Now is a local public television program presented by PBS Wisconsin
Here and Now
Madison Confronts the Enormity of the Abundant Life Shooting
Clip: Season 2300 Episode 2324 | 4m 17sVideo has Closed Captions
Following the shooting at Abundant Life Christian School where a teacher and student were killed, educators and the broader Madison community grapple directly with a nationwide epidemic of violence.
Problems with Closed Captions? Closed Captioning Feedback
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorship>> Details continue to unfold following the devastating shooting inside a classroom at a Madison Christian school five days ago.
According to the AP, a man in California has been ordered by a court there to turn in his weapons and ammunition after interacting with the 15 year old shooter online about plotting a mass shooting with her in Madison, two members of the school community were shot to death, and the 15 year old took her own life, according to police.
The teacher killed was 42 year old Aaron Macheel West.
She was a substitute coordinator.
The student, who also died at the scene was 14 year old Ruby Patricia Vergara.
She was a freshman "Here& Now".
Reporter Aditi Debnath has more on the aftermath of the violence.
Reporter to a city mourned at a candlelight vigil outside the state Capitol.
>> Coming together following the shocking violence on Monday at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison.
That's when a teenage girl shot and killed a fellow student.
A teacher, and then herself inside the school.
I pray for you.
Jackson Ida went to the vigil to support his friends at Abundant Life.
>> It was just a whole range of like, worried ness and sadness and confusion.
>> Three dead, six wounded and hospitalized.
Two of the victims suffering grave injuries.
Executive director of the school system that manages abundant life.
Chuck Moore was at the vigil.
>> Please pray for the two that are still in the hospital.
It's life threatening and they may not survive.
>> Police are still piecing together what happened.
>> The first officers arrived at 11 a.m. And immediately went in the building.
>> After determining the shooter had taken her own life and transporting the injured to a hospital.
Police prioritized Reunifying students and teachers with their families.
Eight miles away, police served a search warrant at the shooter's family home looking for evidence.
>> They kind of all just swarmed right across the street to where it happened.
>> Police identified the shooter as Natalie Rupnow, a 15 year old student at Abundant Life.
>> We're a small, private Christian school here on the east side of Madison.
>> Barbara Wiers is an administrator at Abundant Life.
She shared details about the school's security measures, which include security cameras and regular lockdown drills.
>> When they heard lockdown, lockdown and nothing else, they knew it was real.
>> Abundant life has been closed since the shooting.
Neighbor McKenzie Truitt visited the school to add a poinsettia plant to a sidewalk memorial honoring the victims of the shooting.
>> My younger brother went there.
I have a lot of friends, family, friends that go there as well.
>> Truitt says her brother knows the victims personally.
>> It affects everybody.
I mean, when you go through a trauma like this, it's horrible.
Even if you weren't directly impacted, it still causes a lot of harm to you mentally.
Just knowing what other people are going through.
>> The rest of Madison schools stayed open, but some were placed on a brief, secure hold after receiving hoax threats.
The Madison School District superintendent told those gathered at the vigil that prevention of future school violence goes beyond physical security.
>> I think it'd be easy to say that we're going to work on safety, we're going to work on creating safe schools, and I don't think that goes far enough because we know what many of those things are.
What I plead to you tonight is that we find a new way, a deeper way, a more meaningful way to connect with our community, children to children, children to staff, families to families.
>> For Jackson Ida School safety is key to empowering youth and preventing violence.
>> I mean, the whole point of all of this is to be able to go and to get education so you can become the people who will hopefully be able to make this never happen again in the futur.
>> Reporting from Madison.
I'm
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