After the shootings, how Santa Barbara is trying to heal (+video)

The response to the killing rampage in Santa Barbara, Calif., has included not only a memorial service but also memorial walls, comfort dogs, and instant offices for counseling.

From one end of the University of California, Santa Barbara, to the other, it is clear this is a campus and community on the mend, after a deadly rampage that took six lives, along with the young killer, and injured 13.

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Some 20,000 students, teachers, and family members gathered on Tuesday for a memorial service at Harder Stadium to mark "a day of mourning and reflection," amid all the sadly familiar conventions of grief support after mass killings.

"This has been very difficult and frankly, there are people from one end of the spectrum to the other in their ability to cope, says senior David Ragan, standing outside the Student Resource Center with a handmade sign: Free Hugs.

Some people are religious and some arent, and everyone is going inside themselves to replace the darkness with light in their own way, he says, noting that individual responses to his full afternoon of hugs ranged from tears or no response to "Im OK" or "Im great."

Twenty yards away, a football field-sized green is sprinkled with temporary gazebos populated with volunteers from support groups such as the Hope network and Love on a Leash, providing animal-assisted crisis response and pet provided therapy, respectively. Larger dogs lie with paws outstretched, stroked by passersby students, faculty, and residents of nearby Isla Vista, the sprawling community of apartments, small houses, restaurants, and sorority and fraternity houses that abuts the campus of 22,000 students.

Both the dogs and their handlers are trained to provide support to anyone deeply affected by these crises and disasters, says LaWana Heald, Hope's Southwest regional director, handing out a four-color card of Robby, a golden retriever and yellow Labrador mix, who had been screened and trained for his ability to make people smile.

Volunteers from UCSBs Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS) hand out blue paper sheets with 11 points of Strategies for Managing Grief, such as: A rule of thumb is this: If you feel like crying, then cry. If not, then dont. Sometimes something funny will happen, just like it used to. When that happens, go ahead and laugh. Its OK.

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After the shootings, how Santa Barbara is trying to heal (+video)