It was a Thursday afternoon during my sophomore year of high school. An ordinary

school day had gone by with my AP Government & Politics class, my Art class, and I was now

in my final class of the day, Math. I was looking forward to my afterschool activities of field

hockey practice and team dinner, followed by my ballet and tap classes at my dance studio. I

always dreaded attending my math classes, so I wanted to get this class period over with for the

day.

My math teacher, Mr. Bach, was in the middle of teaching a lesson for the day, when our

principal, Mr. Lopez, went on the intercom and said something along the lines of “teachers check

your emails and please shelter in place.” Mr. Bach proceeded to check his email, where he

learned and shared that there was a gun on campus and that we needed to stay in our classroom

until told otherwise. Mr. Bach made the classroom dark, by turning off the lights, locking the

classroom door, and continuing the math lesson.

The classroom was now filled with darkness. Some daylight did shine in from the

windows, giving me the ability to still see my surroundings. The darkened light and the brief

information caused me to no longer focus on the math lesson.

My assigned desk seat stood in the back corner of the classroom. This made me hidden

enough to be able to check my phone for more information.

My phone instantly began getting swamped with text messages from my field hockey

group chat about the situation and how each classroom chose to handle it. “What's going on” and

“I can see police outside of our window” were some of the texts. Through these, I soon

discovered that my classroom was one of the only ones to continue the lesson and not barricade

their door. I felt as if Mr. Bach wasn’t doing enough to protect us.

My friend Alannah was in the class with me. I went up to her and said, “we’re going to

die, we’re going to die,” both sarcastically and hypothetically. We went to talk to Mr. Bach about

how our classroom isn’t doing enough to stay safe. His response proceeded with he had not

received any messages telling him to do more, so he shrugged it off. I began to internally panic

that something horrid was going to happen to me.

I then texted my mom to explain the situation I was in. She proceeded to call the district

office asking for updates, but they had no clue my school had anything going on. That made me

so upset that information regarding students' safety wasn’t being given to them. However, my

mom got the district involved and she was able to provide updates because my teacher clearly

wasn’t doing anything helpful.

By now it was 2:30 pm, so the school day was over. However, we had to stay in the

classroom because the situation wasn’t cleared yet. I continued seeing posts on Snapchat of what

was happening in other classrooms and how close the cops were to them. The cops had guns

pointed at students as they one-by-one vacated classrooms. Seeing this made me even more

nervous and scared. The posts showed where on camps the police were and, thankfully, the

incident was on the opposite side of campus as my classroom. And, the math classrooms are in

the back corner of the school, so that made me feel a little safer.

Since the class period was over, Mr. Bach began to play video games with some of my

classmates. The volume of the classroom skyrocketed. It was so loud, I could barely think

straight. It sounded as if I was in a classroom full of elementary school-aged children during free

time. “Rat-a-tat; rat-a-tat” was coming from Nathan’s drumsticks on the desk and many people

were yelling across the classroom.

My classmate, Bella, had a sister in the neighboring classroom texting her about how

loud our classroom was, especially in such a situation. As well, her sisters’ teacher was the math

department chair and was somewhat in charge of the math wing of campus at the moment. Bella

was telling Mr. Bach that emails were sent to him regarding what he should actively do, but he

chose to ignore them. That made me furious. The adult responsible for me wasn’t doing all he

could to protect me.

Finally, around 3:15 pm he decided to check his email. Where *SHOCKER* it read, “to

barricade the door and stay silent.” We proceeded to follow these instructions and it made me

feel calmer, knowing something to protect my and my classmates' safety was now being done.

My classmates and I put our backpacks in one corner of the classroom and took all the

desks and chairs to make a barricade. Desks got stacked to block the doorway. A wall was made,

in the opposite front corner as the door, with the remaining desks for us to hide behind. The

classroom finally became quiet, giving me peace.

Around 3:30, briefly, after we finally made our door barricade, Mr. Lopez went back on

the intercom saying, “the situation has been cleared and we could now leave school for the day.”

I was relieved we were no longer in immediate danger.

We cleaned the barricade up and walked to the front of the school. There were about 30

police cars surrounding the campus, and I was hearing “tocotocotoco” from helicopters above.

Even though I was taking the situation seriously, I didn’t realize how serious this was until this

moment. There were reporters interviewing students. Teachers and staff were firmly telling us to

“get off campus and go home” as we were trying to arrange rides. It was a wild afternoon with so

many emotions going to process.

My field hockey practice was canceled, but we proceeded to still gather for the team

dinner. I went there immediately after leaving school. It was a chance to process what happened

to us and share our unique stories. Through this, I learned that a student posted a picture of a gun

on their Snapchat story the previous day, then left it in their brothers' car (on campus) this day. I

still do not know their intentions with the gun, but it was a scary situation to experience and

witness.

As parents began to arrive to pick us up, some began to cry after being able to see their

children. My friend Sydney’s mom cried and said “I was so scared for you” as she hugged her.

My mom picked me up and had a similar reaction.

I proceeded to go to my dance studio, that night, for my competition practices. My dance

friends had learned what happened and were just in shock. “Are you ok?” they asked, as I

explained it to them. I felt safe, but it was a lot to take in.

The next day, I returned to school and the administration was very accommodating. The

morning announcements stated, “we have bagels and therapists available in the library for

anyone who needs them today.”

Teachers, in all my classes, gave us time to process and discuss what happened by having

a chill day of schoolwork. They each explained how the situation took place in their classroom

with their students that period. It very much differed from Mr. Bach’s approach to the situation.

The situation was taken seriously by some, and I appreciated that, contrary to how I felt about

Mr. Bach’s actions.

When my classmates and I got to Mr. Bach’s class, he did something similar to the rest of

my classes, but we directly discussed the situation, since we spent the incident together. We

gently criticized his reaction to taking care of our safety, after comparing other teachers’

reactions. His excuse was everyone interprets what information they are being told differently.

However, this still does not make up for his lack of checking for updates and managing his

classroom. If I was the teacher in the situation, I would have immediately barricaded the

classroom door, kept the classroom volume quiet, and been glued to my computer or phone

waiting for updates.

The end of the school year came around, and Mr. Bach announced he would not be

returning the following year. I know he got laid off, and I strongly believe it had something to do

with how he reacted in this situation. Student and child safety is a priority, especially as a teacher

to minors, and Mr. Bach did not provide that.

School shootings continue to occur all over the United States. No one knew the severity

of this situation until after the fact, whether there was just the presence of a gun on campus or an

actual shooting. I hear stories of teachers sacrificing their lives for their students during a school

shooting, and Mr. Bach did the complete opposite of that for us. I felt as if Mr. Bach put us in

more harm's way than actually protecting us.

Thankfully, everyone came out of the situation safe and the one student was punished for

their actions.