BARROW COUNTY, Ga. — In the first week since the Apalachee High School shooting left four dead and nine injured, most Barrow County schools have returned to class.
The community told Channel 2′s Courtney Francisco that times are still tough as new information about the shooting, and 14-year-old suspect Colt Gray, comes to light.
On Wednesday, Colt Gray’s mother Marcee Gray released an apology to the families of victims and said she had tried to warn the school before the tragic event.
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Now, Colt Gray has a new attorney and counselors in Barrow County are working with students and staff to help them cope with the new developments.
Alicia Seymour, an art therapist, is donating her services in Barrow County and told Channel 2 Action News that the road ahead will be difficult.
“This is going to be a tough transition,” Seymour said. “We step up when things like this happen. It wasn’t even a question.”
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Seymour said families are still processing a week’s worth of trauma and grief and crisis teams have come to Barrow County to hep provide comfort and services to the community.
“They have been extremely comforting to the people there,” Seymour said. “There’s a wide variety of therapies available.”
Among those therapies are therapy dogs, that have been making the rounds in schools that have resumed classes in the wake of the shooting.
While most Barrow County schools returned to operations on Tuesday, Apalachee High School remains closed.
Seymour told Channel 2 Action News that bringing the Apalachee High School students back to class will be hard.
“We need to be watching them for changes in behavior, watching for sadness, normalizing them talking about their feelings,” Seymour said.
She’s also urging parents to be proactive because their kids may not recognize a trauma response when it happens.
Free grief counseling is available at the Barrow County Community Center on 2nd Street.
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