Many in the Southern California community feel helpless after a tragic classroom shooting in San Bernardino left a teacher and student dead, but some are finding ways to help.
After a gunman opened fire in a San Bernardino elementary school classroom, leaving a special needs teacher and student dead and wounding a 9-year-old, the psychology department at Cal State University San Bernardino was asking for teddy bear donations.
The department planned to collect the teddy bears and hand them out to students as they returned to North Park Elementary School Monday following the tragedy.
The day after the shooting, a photo showed a collection of stuffed animals donated by strangers to welcome the students back to school.
"It's been inspiring and joyful during a challenging day to see how many people come together and want to help the healing process," said Stacy C Brooks of Cal State San Bernardino's College of Social Behavioral Sciences. "I am confident that we will have over a 1000 before we are finished tomorrow... The Inland Empire is a wonderful place to live."
She also said it was only a "band-aid," but something that may help the children heal.
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The department was asking for donations by Wednesday.
Anyone interested can donate at the Social Behavioral Science room SBS-424 or at the red box on the 4th floor of the university campus.
A GoFund Me account was also created to help the family of the slain student, Jonathan Martinez.
If you would like to donate to a GoFundMe account set up to help, you may do so here. Note that GoFundMe deducts 7.9 percent of all funds raised in the form of platform and payment processing charges.
