It seems hard to believe that 10 years have passed since that horrible day.

September 13, 2006, was a beautiful summer day in Montreal and Dawson College was still abuzz with the promise of a new year. 

In an instant everything changed when a madman, a gun-loving loner, opened fire on our children. The innocence and joy of CEGEP life was destroyed.   

Most Montrealers can tell you exactly where they were when they heard the news. It began at 12:35 p.m. and less half an hour later it was over and the man who wanted to kill so many was dead.

He had come heavily armed with guns that were all legally obtained. With more than 1000 rounds of ammunition, his goal was clearly mass murder.

He killed one lovely young woman by the name of Anastasia De Sousa and he shot 16 others.   

There was so much confusion that day. Was there more than one gunman? Some reports said there were two or maybe three. How many people were shot?

It was a time when cellphones were becoming popular and for the first time we witnessed a horrible news event in real time. There were many cell phone videos and texts, as well as calls of distress or comfort.

I remember that day as if it were yesterday. My daughter was in the cafeteria when the shooting started. She left her phone on the table when she fled. It was a long day indeed.

The effects were long lasting. A Study showed that 30% of Dawson students suffered from psychological disorders following the attack.

We have made some progress. The Quebec government passed Anastasia's Law, which helped, but the real change must come from Ottawa. 

We do need tougher laws. No one has ever been able to convince me why people who live in urban areas need guns or why anyone needs to own an assault rifle in this country. We do not have a constitutional right to bear arms like our neighbours to the south. You can see how well that has worked for them. There are two million registered gun owners in Canada. Most of them are hunters but the number of restricted guns increased by 9.5 percent in 2015. Since 2004, two years before the Dawson shooting, the number of restricted firearms such as semi-automatic rifles, has doubled.  

The Tories abolished the long gun registry. Quebec will go it alone with its own registry but that is only one part of the solution.   

Along with legislation we need more education and better ways of identifying those who could be violent.

Two years ago, on the anniversary of the shooting, Dawson launched a new Centre for Peace. It is dedicated to peace and non-violence education and it's a very good start. 

Yes, it was a day that we will not forget. 

On Tuesday morning, take a moment to remember and reflect on the day when the beast of hate and violence hit home. Ten years later we should constantly rededicate ourselves to a non -violent future in honour of Anastasia and all the others whose lives were changed on that September day in Montreal.