Anniversary of Virginia Tech shooting being marked; former Yarmouth resident was among the victims

By Tina Comeau

THE VANGUARD

NovaNewsNow.com

Wednesday marks a somber anniversary.

It was one year ago on April 16 that 32 teachers and students, including a former Yarmouth resident, were killed when a student-turned-gunman went on a rampage at Virginia Tech university in Blacksburg, Virginia.

Among the dead were Jocelyne Couture-Nowak, a foreign language professor at the university who spent time growing up in Yarmouth and graduated from Yarmouth Consolidated Memorial High School. She still has many family and friends in the area.

A ceremony honouring the lives of those who died during is planned for today, along with other memorials and reflective gatherings, as the university and community continues to cope with their grief.

Residents of Yarmouth County were stunned last year to hear that one of the people killed was a former resident of the area. Although she had not lived in the area for years, she still had family connections to the area through her mother Anne Boudreau-Bellemare, who was a resident here at the time, and her aunt Muriel Mooney, among others. Her oldest daughter Francine Dulong was born here, although she now lives in British Columbia.

Couture-Nowak had moved from the area as a young girl, but after her parents divorced she had returned. Aside from graduating from the local high school, she worked at the daycare of the Boys and Girls Club and even dabbled with a bed and breakfast business.

Prior to moving to Blacksburg in 2001, she had worked in the Truro area, where she and several other parents founded a French Acadian school.

She was strongly opposed to guns and violence, which made the nature of her death even more tragic.

At Virginia Tech where Couture-Nowak taught French, students have volunteered to teach a proram called “Teach for Madame” to honour her passion for the language and her former students. Some of her other pupils, including one who was shot last year, are also providing French instruction to children at a nearby elementary school.

Last year’s shooting was the largest mass shooting in United States history. After claiming his victims the gunman turned his gun on himself.