A group of American schoolboys all wore suits, ties and hats as a show of support to a younger pupil at their school who was being bullied for his speech impediment.
Danny Keefe, aged 6, has a condition called Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS), a motor speech disorder that prevents his brain from coordinating properly with the muscles that create speech. Danny is very intelligent and knows what he wants to say, but the message gets lost on its way from his brain to his mouth, making him difficult to understand.
Danny began going to school wearing dress shirts and fedoras, and this, combined with his speech defect, attracted the attention of bullies. He would come home from school distraught.
Danny’s older brother Tim rallied 40 of his friends from the fifth grade to take on the bullies. But instead of resorting to violence, the boys all went to school one day wearing suits, ties and hats. Danny led the march on “Danny Appreciation Day” and the results were immediate. The bullying stopped and now, six months later, Danny confidently walks around the school hallways. “No one picks on him anymore,” says his mother. “It’s kind of the opposite now. Kids go up to him and say, ‘Hey, you’re the kid from TV!’”
A fund has been created to help Danny’s costly speech therapy, to which you can donate here
