How Many Lives Have You Endangered at One Time?

I can't even believe I'm writing this on here, for all of you 5 readers to see. I'm so embarrassed & I can't remember the last time I did something that made me feel so stupid (none of you need to comment, reminding me of such other times, by the way!).

In an effort to keep our school safe, we have now had 2 'lock down' drills. The first one happened the first six weeks of school, & our principal told us the day it would happen, & of course we were to not tell the students anything about it. Every day, with no exception, all teachers' doors are to remain locked. We have a small magnet that we use to keep the door propped open. In the event of a lock down drill, or, heaven forbid, someone enters the building being violent, with a gun, etc., all we have to do is remove the magnet & shut our door. We are to get any kids in the hallway into our room, ASAP. It doesn't matter if we know the kids, have them in class or not. We just have to clear the hallway ASAP. I do think it's a good plan.

Well, last Friday at school we had one of these drills. No teachers knew about this. AND it happened during a passing period! For those of you that have been teachers before, you know we have monthly fire drills & it's always AFTER the tardy bell has rung. Anyway, they come on announcements & say "Teachers, we are in a lockdown". That's it. That's the code to take action, & follow the directions I just told you about. So I run to my door (eating a Krispy Kreme donut, by the way) & get kids in my class. Once the hall is cleared I get the door shut. I sit in my chair in my room & tell the kids to stay quiet & tell them to relax, it's just a drill (well, really I guess I didn't know that but I just assumed b/c we always think 'this can't happen to US', right?). Then a guy knocks on the door. I saw him walk past my door during all this action of getting kids in. So I go & open the door & say 'yes?' to him. WHAT THE BUCK, MISS WILSON?! Why did I open my door? He says to me "do you know who I am?" & I say to myself "oh ship!" & I tell him I know him from the administration building. He was very nice about it & introduced himself as blah blah & said he could have been a violent person & I am not to open my door to anyone during a lock down, no matter who it is. DUH! I felt like such a failure. Meanwhile I'm looking all over him like crazy for a badge but of course he isn't wearing it, for this reason (yes, the 'big wigs' from the administration building apparently do these as surprises to the school, to test us, to prepare us in the event it does happen).

The guy then told me to turn my lights off. Well, I have NO windows in my class & in our last meeting the principal told us to only turn off lights if we have windows. B/c can you imagine what a bunch of 7th graders would do in pitch black?! Yikes. Anyway so I told him I was told to NOT do that & he told me to do that. Yes, sir, I told him! & he told me to get the kids behind my desk, so they aren't directly in front of the window of my classroom door.

Anyway-I'm sure he gave my room number to my principal, saying I opened my door to a stranger. I did hear that another teacher opened her door to him as well. She's worked in this district a LONG time (Oh yeah-it was Ms. Berry, Lindley - she was the math teacher on our team!) so she could have recognized him as well.

Then they came on announcements & said the lockdown was over. So kids all went to their correct class & class went on as usual. When that class period ended, I walked into the hall with a look of defeat on my face. Well, the coach across the hall also had that same look on his face. I said to him "I opened my door to the intruder". He said "the intruder was standing in my room as I was getting kids inside". Well, so I don't know which is worse. Anyway, this coach didn't say anything to him b/c he knew his name & everything & when the guy said to the coach "do you know who I am?" & the coach did tell him his name & said 'you work at the administration building!' I wonder what the guy said to that?

Anyway, Wednesday we are having a faculty meeting where we will debrief everything. Oh how I hope I'm not called out as opening my door to the intruder! :(

THANK GOODNESS it was just a drill & you know I'll NEVER make this mistake again!

So, how many lives have you endangered at once???