The Macomb County Prosecutor’s Office asked Macomb County middle and high school students to participate in the “Knocking Violence out of My School,” video competition. This friendly competition gave students the opportunity to talk peer-to-peer about how they feel about school threats, violence, weapons, and bullying in their school.
Wednesday, the Macomb County Prosecutor’s Office presented senior Cole Pannell from New Haven High School the $750 second place prize for the “Knocking Violence out of My School” video competition. He was also presented the Macomb County Prosecutor’s Hero Award for his school.
Pannell says, “When I initially saw the competition I wanted to do it because I love to produce little short films with my friends. As I began to storyboard the video I started to relate to the topic more and more. This year alone my school has experienced threats. One of my friends missed his senior night for soccer because of a ‘joke’ he made to his friends. That incident is one of the many events that helped inspire me to work on this video. I thought this video competition was an amazing idea to engage more students about the issue of threats, bullying and other issues that plague schools. I loved working on this with my friends knowing that our classmates would see our video and have an impact on them.``
Pannell started Cole Pannell Photography with his brother. In October 2022, his photography was exhibited in the Anton Art Center in Mount Clemens.
To view Pannell’s video, visit https://youtu.be/aXSJKdDd3Vw.
