A living legacy created to honor the victims of April 16, 2007, support the survivors, and advocate for change that promotes a safer, more compassionate, and caring world.
Our Story
United by tragedy, with paths crossed and lives all-at-once intertwined, we shared stories and memories and sometimes just silence ⎯ raw emotion ⎯ as we walked down this broken journey together.
We felt the gaping presence of those lost and gone forever ⎯ taken all too soon in one of the most inhumane ways possible ⎯ as we bonded together as a family of sorts. We became an unintended family not a single one of us ever wished to be a part of. But here we were: the survivors ⎯ the parents, siblings, students, classmates, spouses, and children of those killed in the largest mass shooting on a college campus ever in our nation’s history ⎯ navigating through horror of immense magnitude, destruction, and violence.
We came from all different backgrounds, from a handful of different countries, with varying political views and religious affiliations. Still, two common themes united us: prevention and care.
How could this have happened? How could this have been prevented? We felt a burning responsibility from the beginning to use our own experiences, and the resources we gained through our own journeys toward recovery and resiliency, to create a foundation that would help prevent future similar tragedies from occurring. We wanted to create a living legacy for the 32 lives lost that might bring awareness to, and provide education on, school and campus safety and the resulting aftermath of mass gun violence. Just as importantly, we wanted to make sure, barring all of our best efforts, that should a future tragedy occur, everyone involved would have the opportunity to receive quality, compassionate, medical and psychological care, long-term.
And so was born VTV Family Outreach Foundation.
Our Impact
Today, our programs assist mass shooting survivors nationwide with their long-term physical and psychological trauma-related care needs.
VTVCare is currently VTV's main focus program. VTVCare is a non-profit movement created with the sole purpose of assisting mass shooting survivors with their long-term physical and psychological trauma-related care needs.
Historically, VTV's programs have produced safer schools. Specifically, we have contributed to important legislative changes and supported the following programs and initiatives.
Initiatives
32 National Campus Safety Initiative (32 NCSI)
Following the 2007 tragedy at Virginia Tech, survivors and victims’ families joined together to uncover all dimensions of campus safety, and facilitate a forum where national experts could develop best practices and resources relating to campus safety and security.
The result was this confidential, self-paced, online self-assessment program, designed by a team of leading campus safety experts, that colleges and universities can use to better assess themselves across 9 key areas of campus safety. Learn more…
Promoting Positive Practices SRO Model & Training
Funded by the U.S. Department of Justice’s office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS), and in collaboration with the Virginia Tech Center for Applied Behavior Systems, VTV developed this comprehensive safety model and training program for K-12 School Resource Officers (SROs) and their school-based partners. The Promoting Positive Practices (P3) SRO Model and Training Program was designed to improve collaboration among previously non-integrated groups and emphasize problem solving and youth development in a positive school climate.
Learn more…
National Center for Campus Public Safety (NCCPS)
Through years of work at the White House, U.S. Capitol, Department of Education, Department of Justice, and other areas of influence, VTV championed the creation of the National Center for Campus Public Safety on March 14, 2013, via the CAMPUS Safety Act, as well as the funding of NCCPS on May 30, 2014. Guided by an advisory board, on which VTV is represented, NCCPS serves as a national clearinghouse for research, best practices, and training for college and university police and security.
Campus Save Act
VTV was at the forefront, along with a diverse coalition of national organizations, of securing the 2013 passage of the “Campus Sexual Violence Elimination Act” or “Campus SaVE Act” (also known as the VAWA amendments to the Clery Act or the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act 0f 2013 – H.R. 4970, S.1925 – signed into law by President Obama on March 7, 2013) that enhanced and modernized the two-decade-old federal campus sexual violence prevention and response guidelines. VTV’s prior 32 NCSI Director, S. Daniel Carter, served as one of fifteen Negotiated Rule making Committee members that aided the Department of Education in crafting these proposed regulations. VTV also used traditional media to address the 20-year old sexual assault provisions in the Jeanne Clery Act to expand them to include dating violence, domestic violence, and stalking.
Crisis Response
VTV’s Crisis Response team is a group of trained VTV family members who provide assistance upon request to victims of mass school violence and similar tragedies. We offer trained responders, informed by experience, to help victims, survivors, families, teachers, staff and their connected community in the aftermath of mass shooting violence.
Legislative Achievements
Soon after the April 16, 2007 tragedy, a group of family members and survivors embraced this selfless mission.
REACH ACT COALITION
In 2021, the VTV Family Outreach Foundation supported the “Report and Educate About Campus Hazing (REACH) Act,” bill and urged the House and Senate Education Committees to consider and favorably report the REACH Act to the House and Senate floor for a vote. The bill, introduced by a bipartisan group of lawmakers, would promote campus safety and be an invaluable tool in hazing prevention efforts - keeping students safe and alive at school. View the REACH Act Coalition Letter.
FIX NICS ACT
Family members and survivors approached then-Virginia Governor Tim Kaine to seek a change in Virginia law that had allowed the shooter to buy his guns legally. A formal determination had been made by the Commonwealth that the shooter had been a danger to himself. His name; however, was not submitted to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) because he was required to seek outpatient, rather than inpatient, treatment.
Ultimately, working with Governor Kaine, the General Assembly, and interest groups such as the National Rifle Association (NRA) and the Brady Campaign, legislation was passed to ensure that an involuntary commitment to outpatient treatment would be grounds for inclusion into NICS.
Then, the Virginia Tech group continued to work with the NRA and the Brady Campaign, with support of Virginia’s U.S. Senators, to pass federal legislation that provided grant funds for other states willing to follow Virginia’s lead on this issue. This was the original Fix NICS Act. It was needed because the Supreme Court ruled it was unconstitutional to require states to submit the names of people legally prohibited from buying a gun to the federal government.
Early in 2018, with VTV’s support and urging, a bipartisan revision and improvement of the Fix NICS Act was passed. This was spurred by the mass shooting tragedy in Sutherland Springs, Texas that took 26 lives.The law applies penalties to government agencies for not reporting to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
AMENDING THE CLERY ACT
In one of VTV’s earliest impacts, families banded together in 2008 and told Congress to amend the Clery Act because “these warnings must be issued as soon as possible”. As a result of their influence and others, The Higher Education Opportunity Act (Public Law 110-315) (HEOA) included amendments to the Clery Act to require campuses to issue immediate notifications about any emergency situation that is a threat to the health or safety of students and employees.
Among other updates, HEOA also requires state universities to know their emergency management plans, conduct exercise drills every year, have an emergency notification system in place, and use it in a timely manner. HEOA also provided for a matching grant program so colleges and universities could fund safety and security improvement initiatives. There is also a provision for mental health services for students and staff so they can be coordinated with appropriate local entities. The HEOA bill was signed into law on August 14, 2008 by President Bush, reauthorizing the amended version of the Higher Education Act (HEA) of 1965.
COLLEGE CAMPUS LAWS PASSED
Between 2010 -2015, both VTV and its sister organization, Angel Fund, successfully advanced legislation in Virginia to help make our college and university campuses safer.
2015 – SB 1122 requires each public institution of higher education’s policies that advise students, faculty, and staff of the proper procedures for identifying and addressing the needs of students exhibiting suicidal tendencies or behavior to require procedures for notifying the institution’s student health or counseling center when a student exhibits suicidal tendencies or behavior.
2014 – SB 239 requires the violence prevention committee of each public institution of higher education to establish policies and procedures that outline circumstances under which all faculty and staff are to report threatening or aberrant behavior that may represent a physical threat to the community. The bill also requires each violence prevention committee to include notification of family members or guardians, or both, as a sufficient means of action in the committee’s policies and procedures for the assessment of individuals whose behavior may present a physical threat, unless such notification would prove harmful to the individual in question.
2013 – SB 1078 requires the State Board for Community Colleges to develop a mental health referral policy that would require community colleges to designate at least one individual at each college to serve as a point of contact with an emergency services system clinician at a local community services board, or another qualified mental health services provider, for screenings and referrals of students who may have emergency or urgent mental health needs.
2010 – SB 608 This legislation requires the president and vice-president of each public institution of higher education, or the superintendent in the case of the Virginia Military Institute, to annually certify in writing to the Department of Emergency Management comprehension and understanding of the institution’s crisis and emergency management plan. The bill also provides that each public institution of higher education shall annually conduct a functional exercise in accordance with the protocols established by the institution’s crisis and emergency management.
Remembrance Activities
In the past, VTV has organized activities in remembrance of the 32 innocent lives lost on April 16, 2007.
In collaboration with Virginia Tech, an on-campus art exhibit was hosted on the 5th anniversary of the tragedy. Several golf tournaments and gran fondos (bike rides of 32 and 100 miles) have also been organized. “Through the Storm”, a hand bell performance, was commissioned by VTV and dedicated to the April 16, 2007 victims and survivors on May 12, 2013.
The Heart of Virginia Foundation
VTV funded the maintenance of a school bus that travelled throughout the United States to visit young people on college campuses in an effort to reduce the stigma of mental illness. For more information on The Heart of Virginia Foundation, visit TheHeartofVA.
Intergenerational Day Camp
VTV funded adult daycare scholarship fees for five adults, fifty t-shirts for children ages 5-12, and camp fees for 18-year olds and older to attend this camp, which focused on cultural diversity and peace-building. For more information on Generations Crossings, visit www.generationscrossing.com.
Violence Prevention Conference
VTV co-sponsored the January 2015 Violence Prevention Conference offered by the Student Affairs Professionals in Higher Education (NASPA).
Higher Education Opportunity Act (HEOA) of 2008
In one of VTV’s earliest impacts, families banded together in 2008 and told Congress to amend the Clery Act because “these warnings must be issued as soon as possible”. As a result of their influence and others, HEOA included amendments to the Clery Act to require campuses to issue immediate notifications about any emergency situation that is a threat to the health or safety of students and employees.Among other updates, HEOA also requires state universities to know their emergency management plans, conduct exercise drills every year, have an emergency notification system in place, and use it in a timely manner. HEOA also provided for a matching grant program so colleges and universities could fund safety and security improvement initiatives. There is also a provision for mental health services for students and staff so they can be coordinated with appropriate local entities.The HEOA bill was signed into law on August 14, 2008 by President Bush, reauthorizing the amended version of the Higher Education Act (HEA) of 1965.
The Tree Grove at Chinquapin Park
On Sunday, April 29, 2018, VTV initiated the first planting of the Grove at Chinquapin Park in Alexandria, Virginia. Designed by Landscape Architecture students studying at Virginia Tech’s Old Town Campus, forty-nine trees were planted in honor of the victims and survivors of the April 16, 2007 Virginia Tech shootings. This grove provides a space for residents to sit, reflect, remember, and contemplate the work that still needs to be done in order to prevent mass shooting violence from continuing to plague our society.
Collaboration with Other Advocacy Groups
VTV has hosted representatives from Columbine, Sandy Hook, PEACE OUTside Campus, CLEARCAUSE, Michael H. Minger Foundation, and others groups during our annual meetings and other events – in an effort to establish healthy, collaborative relationships with organizations having similar goals, and to broaden our scope on educating schools, colleges and the general public.
Get Involved
By donating to VTVCare you will be making a difference in the lives of mass shooting survivors nationwide. 100% of your donation will be used to assist mass shooting survivors with their long-term trauma-related care needs. Your donation will change someone's life. Will you CARE?