- A student of ours was raped and murdered while jogging alone, she was 15/16. It was a very dark time and it was made worse by the media constantly going on and on about it, especially since the court case went on for a year. The kids have dealt with it well though, considering.
— gintypuff - One student committed suicide about a year after he changed to another school. His brother was still with us. The school was fairly large, so it mainly affected his former friends and his brother's classmates.
— incapability879 - During my first year teaching, a very well-liked 8th grader was hit by a car while running across the road foolishly, and died almost instantly. Teachers had to read a statement to their homeroom classes the next day at school. It was a terrible day, with students crying all day, and counselors were called from all over the county to see grieving students. There were vigils, fund raisers, and prayer circles for about a month after, but children are resilient and pretty much forgot about it shortly after. There was a tribute to him in the yearbook.
— whatsername__ - The school district had set up a suicide hotline. The first year it was implemented, it wasn't that affective. There was student really distraught and stressed and considered suicide. He called the hotline and was put on hold for almost 10 minutes. He killed himself.
It was shocking because no one expected that and he showed no signs during school. Some people knew that his parents were hard on him but no one thought it would go to that.
The school fixed the hotline.
Edit: The hotline was for the entire district, not just for one school.
— MarchKick - One of my students was murdered by his mother. I taught 8th grade at the time. The kids were shocked and saddened, but the day they found out, they organized a car wash to help the father pay for funeral expenses. I was so proud of how they turned their grief into something productive. During the car wash, they were playing the deceased student's favorite songs and celebrating him. It brought the students closer together.
— tacothetownn - Larger school for our state, so it has happened a couple of times.
The first time a student that i knew died in an accident on his way to work. Both he and his girlfriend were in my class. He would always come in and put her chair down before the start of class. It was heartbreaking to see her have to put her own chair down that first day back.
We had a teacher die during school once. That was tough on most of us, she had been a teacher for a full career and then had been subbing for over 20 years. Almost every student knew her at some point. A parent complained that she got an in loving memory page in the yearbook, but her c team soccer star didn't have any soccer photos in the yearbook. Also, after a day or so, students started complaining about times she had given them discipline and a couple expressed that dying was fitting for that detention they got in 6th grade. Assholes.
Mostly, high school is a time where young adults are figuring out who they are and where they fit in the grand scheme of things. Deaths, especially of fellow students, are a huge shock to the system for this age group. Teens are also fairly narcissistic, so it's not unusual to see them engage in a bit of one-upping each other around how well they knew the deceased, they kind of jockey for "most grieved" or "most callous." It bothered me the first time I experienced it as a teacher, now I get that it's a part of them growing up.
Seriously though, screw that parent complaining about the in loving memory pages. At least most teens grow out of that kind of thing.
— baconman100 - I've had two die while in my school, but not actually at school. (Middle school, 6 - 8 grade.) One girl had brain cancer. Fought it in 2nd grade, went into remission, started coming back in 6th grade, when I taught her. Sweet, studious, wanted to do her best and just be normal. She was in school most of 7th grade, but finally had to taught at home. (Still enrolled in school, but the teachers would send the work home and one teacher, assigned by the district, would go once a week to teach the concepts. Forget what it is called, often used with severe injuries.) She died in 8th grade. It had a much larger impact on the teachers than the student body because in the year she wasn't there, most of the kids forgot about her, other than her friends.
The other death was a 7th grade boy. He drowned in his bathtub. I had the older 1/2 brother who had found him, dragged him out of the tub and tried to do CPR, even though the kid had probably been dead for 15 to 30 minutes at that time. He was not a sweet child, or even a good kid, but he wasn't mean either. His death really hit the kids (and his teachers) hard because it was so random and sudden. A lot of questioning about mortality and a lot of fears showed up too.
Worse are the ones who died between 9 - 12 grade. 4 suicides of just the kids I've taught. Shooting, hanging, poison and jumping off a bridge onto the highway. The hardest one was Arpan. He jumped off a bridge after getting a low grade (probably an 80, knowing him) on a test and his girl breaking up with him. Too much stress to be the perfect son, too much attention to grades. Suicides are always hard for the students. Often times they come in waves as it becomes a viable option suddenly. "If he can do that, so can I." Lots of questions, lots of fears show up. Also, the teachers and students watch out for each other with care... at least for a little while.
I still think about Arpan a lot. That uptight little boy who became funny and silly in my class with encouragement. Signed all the yearbooks with "I'll always remember this year. All my love" - both girls and boys. Said it would confuse people when they were adults. Suicides are the worst.
— mel2mdl - A student killed himself after midterm exam.
When I arrived at school we were told that we are dimissed early and should go straight home without talking to anyone. I thought it was treat after exhausting exam week.
But my friend told me, a boy killed himself by jumping off from his apartment. The school was trying to silence the news by sending us home early. But I guess it didn't work cause my mom heard about it already when I got home. I heard that he fought with his mother about the grade and I guess he died in the morning.
It was sad but I understood hime because I knew *exactly* how he felt. I lived in an very education focused city, and competition for prestigious high school was through the roof that time.
To be honest I thought he was brave to pull the trigger and be done with this whole thing.
I(and everyone) had classes till midnight or more. We studied IBT, high school math, science and some even had classes for SAT. **We WERE 15**
The next day, when I went to school everything was same. School went as normal and no one talked about it. My friend suggested me to see the classroom that boy was in. And when I went to his class I was devastated.
Nobody was sad. Everything was same. Girls talking and laughing, boys running around, students from other classes crowded to see the 'hot new event'.
On his desk was white Chrysanthemum and that was it. Nobody cared, they were bumping around the desk as if he was just gone for few days or as if he did not ever existed.
Now, as I get older I think about him from time to time and every year it makes me sadder and sadder. I never knew him but I heard he was a good kid, got good grades and gernally nice person. But I would never know, *many* would never know. Now, most would have forgotten him or just vaguely remember hims as 'the one who comitted suicide'. Heck, I don't even know his name. Some would even say he was 'the weak one' and his does not matter. Or he is just a number on sucide statistics. We all know he is more than that, but he can not show it to us, so he vanish from the school, class,... and eventually from our minds.
Everytime when things get better I hope he is here too. I wish he is alive here with us and see that middle school grade is not the end of the world or high school, or unverisity, or jobs... etc.
I also did not know things could get better and grades and good school is not all that matters. But he could not live through to see that and now, he's gone. I wish he got to enjoy life more, experience other things than school and studying. I wish for so many more but...
My wish right now is that this gets read by many people so at least he can stay with us for a little while. My writing is not the best but I hope I got to the point.
+) I want to add that it is getting better right now. It is illegal to have class later than 10 pm, no exterior English Tests like Ibt can be submitted for university entrance exam...etc. I am no longer a student so I don't know how it affects actual students but I hope it is helping them.
— Ineedtofindthismv - At my school, I was pretty new but before I came there was one guy in high school and he died because of a brain tumour. This was about 4 years ago but everyone remembers it. He was a book lover so in memory of him, the school put up a bench in the shape of a book with his name on it. To this day the whole school remembers him.
— blyat_master9 - We had a student a few years ago take his own life. He was twelve. I think we all felt responsible (staff). The family kept the details quiet, and there really wasn't a giant response from the students. More kids threaten to kill themselves now and we take that seriously. We always did before, but that kid didn't threaten anything. He just did it. I never even met the kid, but I still felt responsible.
When I was younger, my older brother died at 16. He was , funny, kind, and popular. They closed school for 3 days, planted trees in his honor and created a memorial scholarship in his name. I remember thinking that it seemed like the whole school was camping on our lawn for days ( there were literally people sleeping out there). We moved away after that, but went back a year later for the first scholarship award and kids were still crying.
— creepysnowflake - Kindergarten assistant teacher.
Lovely little girl, bright, funny and just the sweetest kid to teach.
Not a month into school, we got a call from her mom that she was in the hospital. When she came back to class, she told everyone that the doctor told her she has cancer.
She came to school as often as she could. We gave her cute hats to wear when she lost her hair. All the kids made cards for her when she was finally too sick to come in anymore.
I had to sit a bunch of kids down and tell them that she wasn't going to be coming back to school anymore. Kids that young don't understand the concept of dying - to them it's the same as just going away for a while, so they kept asking when she'd come back.
I went to her funeral. Sat in the back because I felt out of place, but that little girl was just a brilliant child. She should've had her whole life ahead of her, and then she was just gone.
I still go and put flowers on her grave at the start of every school year. She'd be 9 this year if she's lived.
Cancer can go fuck itself.
— untilwhenevervip - In 30 years we lost many students, most to car crashes, but also one who fell off a cliff while hiking and perhaps the most devastating to the school was one who died from a gas leak in his basement while he slept. This popular and very likeable young man was a captain of the wrestling team. He was friendly and kind to everyone. The reason he was in the basement that night was that someone arrived at the house and he had given them his bedroom.
On the other hand, the one who fell off the cliff had been a school bully. It was interesting to watch the students process this as many were secretly relieved by this death while at the same time feeling guilty for not being sad about it.
— Oregonguy1954