We’re always excited to check in with our One Million Bones State Coordinators and hear the ways in which their communities are coming together to join the One Million Bones project. Often, Coordinators are lucky to have the love and support of family and friends and also get the chance to reconnect on a new level with people and places they’ve known for years.

Recently, our Virginia State Coordinator, Alana Simpson, had a unique opportunity to revisit the past and walk the halls of her former high school, but this time as a special guest! Alana was invited to Western Albemarle High School by Laura Chatterson to present the One Million Bones project to her crafts students in grades 9-12.

It was definitely a long, but rewarding day, with six 40-minute presentations to approximately 150 students. During these presentations, Alana asked students to define “genocide” in their own terms, screened both the Albuquerque and New Orleans preview installation videos, discussed current conflicts and began to imagine what many kids their age have been through in those regions.

Alana was thrilled with the response she saw from the students, sharing that “the day could not have gone better and quite frankly it exceeded my expectations!” She received 33 student intern applications and more than 80 e-mail sign-ups for updates on the project! Several of the students started brainstorming on the spot and plan to start a club, hold bake sales to raise money for bone making supplies and get the rest of the school involved with the One Million Bones project through a bonfire and spring fair.



If you live in the Virginia area, Alana would love to hear from you! As we inch closer to our big event on the National Mall in June, 2013, Alana has a lot of exciting bone making activities planned for the spring, including a collaborative, ongoing installation at the Virginia Holocaust Museum in Richmond. Be one in a million: take the challenge!