Its been 22 years since that day and its hard to believe it was that long ago if you are old enough to remember that day you will always remember where and when you where. I have posted this before but will do it again I was the Principal at my HS in NY. I got a call from my superintendent that was urgent. He told me to make an announcement on the PA and I read his statement. Our guidance councilor had already left the building after her parents called the school Her sister worked at one of the towers We had 12 parents that their fathers were NY Firemen and Police officers District office had already singled out our students at the high school and there mothers were coming to school for early release. My secretary had turned on the TV in the administration office. The AV office had already set TV stations in the cafeteria, Gym auditorium , and about 15 classrooms mostly social studies classroom We had to be careful because we knew many of our students had relatives friends etc in the towers. After my PA announcements with in 5 minutes all students were sent to assign rooms to watch the live feed on TV District office had identified those students whose parents worked at the towers and were part of the Fire department and police. They were worried about students they had missed My guidance office although were very helpful were upset because they knew one of there fellow councilors sister was in the tower. The HS was very orderly and as we watched on the news and the 2nd tower being hit . We had our nursing staff in the hallways and used the library as our student center for students that needed counseling.. I was so busy didn't really understand the magnitude of what was going on. I felt like I was the captain of a ship with so many things going on around me. One of the asst supes came into my school to see how the HS was dealing with it. We had 4 elementary schools one Middle school and one HS At the ele school we had a father who we later had died and a few middle school kids parents who were down by the towers. I think I was so preoccupied with my school that I didn't realize that terrorist had done it on purpose. I never got to see and watch the live TV broadcasters and what they were saying. My superintendent called and praised me and told me to cancel all classes but we are not early releasing school Students had to remain in school all day. I went to our snow day schedule where classes are 13 minutes each except for lunch ..Although it was a crazy day we were well prepared and everything was organized My superintendent wanted to address the HS students later in the afternoon which he did. We did have a few hysterical students and we separated them and gave them counseling. The afternoon classes after lunch went pretty smoothly and most of the teachers were awesome under these conditions back later
Hot Forum Topics
