Around lunch time, my coworker friend ran up to me. "Did you hear about what happened?" (whenever someone says this I laugh because by I'm always the last to know). Coworker buddy then began telling me that there was a chemical spill at our local junior high and that the school was being evacuated. "It's ALL over Facebook!" she said.
I noticed that unmistakable worried mom look on many of my fellow teachers who were rushing here and there, furiously texting and getting things "ready" for their departure. More and more teachers started lurking out of their classrooms and the school buzzed with rumors galore!
All afternoon I thought "good thing I'm not at THAT school!" and "good thing I don't have to go THERE". Math went smoothly, and then the kids went to recess. They were gone 2 minutes when the principal came on the over-speaker "Shelter in Place" "Shelter in Place", "this is not a drill, this is real".
I ran outside to gather my class along with several other frenzied teachers. Kids were griping and complaining, arguing that recess wasn't over. I couldn't believe what a hassel it was convincing them to get inside. There we piled in 250 crabby, sweaty 5th graders in the cafeteria and shut the doors. With unbearable noise levels, we waited for news.
It turns out that a junior high student brought a salt shaker full of liquid mercury to school. The student let other kids play with it, and eventually the mercury spilled in the hallway where 10-15 kids tracked it around the school. Several agencies were contacted, and it was decided that the kids who had direct contact would be given medical attention while the other 500 students would go through a quick decontamination process that included confiscating every pair of shoes worn to school that day and destroying them!!. You can only imagine what an uproar this shoe debacle has turned into on several social media sites.
My school was effected because the kids were playing with the mercury on a bus that contained students from three other schools. We were detained for a little over an hour, but it felt like much longer. Also, school is being cancelled tomorrow! We're getting a snow day despite the fact it's been 60 degrees for most of February! The schools will be carefully cleaned to make sure they are safe to go back to on Monday.
I learned a few interesting things from this experience:
1. It's amazing how quickly a big organization can pull itself together for the safety and well being of kids.
2. I need to prepare an emergency fun kit for my class in case this ever happens again! (kids were BEGGING for paper/pencils/anything!).
3. Social media is the go to tool for our current generation in emergencies. Through Facebook our school district released several detailed and up to date messages to the general public.
4. Boring drills actually come in handy for real life emergencies.
Here are some pictures from the incident:
I hope you enjoy your Friday fellow readers, and I hope that none of you ever have to go through any REAL code reds or shelter in places!
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