Sacred Moments
Posted by Mr. Sheehy on April 23, 2007
As we were leaving the Civic Center on Tuesday, April 17th, 2007, I was just so relieved to have the whole thing over with that I was smiling from ear to ear…until I hit that parking lot of parents. There were more of them than when we had first been escorted by the SWAT team, and their faces were worried and solemn. My smile immediately melted. I felt horrible for each of them as they were searching every single one of over 2,000 faces to find the familiar face of their child. I was also a little angered as I saw a camera man from who-knows-where looking at us. He too was searching, but his face was not searching for a loved one. I knew instinctively what he was searching for. He was not filming yet because he was waiting for some red-faced teenage girl in tears holding on to a friend for comfort, or a distraught mom hugging her son like she thought he had been lost forever. It just felt wrong and dirty to see him waiting for it.
Later Tuesday night I thought about my job. I thought about those parents. I know they were all thankful for the police and everyone involved in keeping the kids safe, but I wondered if it really changed anyone’s mind about teachers. There is a legal phrase called in loco parentis that means someone (usually a teacher) acts and makes decisions in place of parents who are not present. That is what we were doing on Tuesday. We were acting on the behalf and in the place of parents who could not at that moment protect or instruct their child and keep them safe. And I wondered if people finally got it that we act in loco parentis every day.
- Ms. O’Dell
