09/11/2026
Never Forget.
The memory is still vivid…burned into my brain…
The bell signaling the end of second period had just rung and my senior Global Studies students filed out to join the other 2,978 students in the halls and walkway of Bridgewater-Raritan high school.
A colleague appeared at my door and said “we’re watching the news down in the workroom and a plane has just hit the World Trade Center”.
I had been to the WTC many times over the years, leading a yearly spring tour to New York with our British exchange students from Kimbolton England, along with their American partners.
My first thoughts were “how horrible” and assumed it must be one of the small sightseeing planes or something like that.
I turned on the TV mounted in the front corner of my room, 416, and was immediately immersed in scenes of the first tower - smoking in the aftermath with causes still unknown.
And as my students for period 3 Global came in, they quickly looked at the monitor and began to ask questions to which I had little answer. But we continued watching - as current events were a big part of our curriculum.
As we sat in rapt attention, we then saw at 9:03, a second plane slam into the towers.
My first thought my was “wait…this is live…it isn’t any replay of what had already transpired” and I said to the class in emerging and horrified realization “that was a second plane…” and the day unfolded from there with the curriculum being an afterthought as my kids and I tried to process and listen to whatever info came our way.
And as the news of the other two planes came to light and the extrapolation to understanding of a terrorist attack, the only solace I took was that I was where I was supposed to be…with my students.
As the succeeding days unfolded - we parsed through it; as a class, a school, a community and a nation.
Everyone’s experience was different - how individually we processed and collectively came together…I visited ground zero a few weeks later, having been drawn to see for myself…the dust, debris, signs of missing loved ones, never to be reunited…
25 years later - it is still a vivid memory. And as I watch the memorial and hear the names - names of those lost in the attack or in the aftermath of first responders hitting the pile without thought for their safety, in NY, The Pentagon, and Shanksville - and the name of Chris Colasanti - a fellow Columbia High School graduate, two years my senior - it remains a seminal point in history.
Perhaps this is just cathartic for me to write as the emotions are reborn…but we today remember and honor those we lost and hold each other a little closer…and as educators, the vital role we have in always being there for our students even as we ourselves struggle to understand…
In memoriam….
New Jersey Education Association Bergen County Education AssociationEssex County Education Association - ECEAAtlantic County Council of Education AssociationsMiddlesex County Education AssociationCamden County Council of Education AssociationsPassaic County Education AssociationsMonmouth County Education AssociationBurlington County Education AssociationOCCEAHudson County Education AssociationNJEA Region 15 - Union CountyNational Education AssociationNJEA Early Career NetworkNJEA PreserviceNJEA Patriots AllianceBergenfield Education AssociationCinnaminson Township Public Schools
