"Proud" Just Doesn't Cut It

The “Ms. Stern” mentioned in the letter above is my older daughter, a veteran teacher in Los Angeles. Both of my daughters are brilliant and remarkable (that’s not just paternal bias), and I generally write to them instead of about them. But I want to share this note written by a young student at Debbie’s school, named Celia.

PHOTO: A Santa Monica police officer leads children on a field trip from Citizens of the World Charter School in Los Angeles out of Santa Monica College, where they had gone for a planetarium show.

That’s Debbie between the police officer and the man in blue on the phone. On June 7th, she took her class on a field trip. They were in the planetarium at Santa Monica College, when 23-year-old John Zawahri went on a shooting rampage on and near the campus killing five and injuring five others. Debbie and her students were locked down for three hours.

When I watched Breaking News on Friday, for some reason I had a bad feeling, although I assumed Debbie was at her school in Los Angeles.

Debbie’s sister, Ruth, had a similar hunch. Debbie lives in Santa Monica, just a block from the house where the first two shootings took place before it was set on fire and the SMC campus is just a few blocks from Debbie’s home.

Thank you, Celia, for your beautiful note about my daughter and for reinforcing my bragging rights.