Hall
of Fame Teacher Helps Students Deal With Tragedy
by
Tom Kertes
On
September 11, through his cavernous classroom windows in the Bronx,
Monroe Campus School teacher Tom Porton was watching the World
Trade Center Towers collapse with his senior English class. “Words
can not describe the students’ reaction–or mine for that matter,”
he said, still shuddering from the awful memory. “Disbelief, anger,
horror, sadness, fear. And, most of all, a feeling of total helplessness
about what to do in order to stop such an atrocity.”
Porton, a member of the Teacher’s Hall of Fame, knew exactly what
to do. His background–a 10-year history of working with students
and families suffering from HIV and AIDS–made him knowledgeable
about dealing with the bereaved.
“The
next day, while the students were out, I decided to take a wall
in the school for use as a memorial,” he said. “This would be
a place the students could write messages of grief, hope, or whatever
else they wanted to write about. In an overwhelmingly tragic situation
like this, it’s all-important for children to be able to express
their feelings openly and without fear.”
Next, Porton had one of the art classes build a tree of remembrance
in the school lobby. Students put the names of people they once
knew but lost on individual leaves. “It could be a loss from this
tragedy or any other loss in the child’s life,” Porton said. “The
important thing was to deal with the concept of loss and achieve
some kind of catharsis.”
“The
overall vision behind our dealing with the tragedy has to be to
talk, to communicate, to get things out,” added the 32-year veteran
of teaching. “It’s very much like therapy. There were no teacher-workshops
on how to specifically do this. We just brainstormed with our
colleagues and did the best we could.”
Porton spent the next few days in his classes playing music. “Mostly
Sixties stuff,” he said. “Those songs of love and brotherhood
acquired a brand new meaning on that horrible day.”
He had his leadership class wear tee-shirts–the words “white,”
“black,” “red,” “yellow,” and “brown” crossed out in the front
and replaced by ‘human.’ “Some of the kids have been wearing those
since the Diallo shooting,” he said. “But, particularly in view
of all the strong anti-Arab sentiment extant, I felt this was
an extra-important message to express right now.”
Porton is currently working with a Chicago cancer survivor and
fellow Hall of Famer, Dr. Larry Barron, on the creation of 50,000
red-white-and-blue boutonnieres that students will hand out all
over the city as part of Project HEART (Healing Empowers America
to Recover from Tragedy). Another major event– aday of healing
and remembrance especially for young people–is in the works in
cooperation with the Board of Education. Porton hopes it will
be held within the month in a large Broadway theater.
“Young
people deserve a special event that’s just for them. After all,
they are our future, our ambassadors of hope.”
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