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Schools

Uprooted students return to campus

The kids at Cross Bayou Elementary had to pull up stakes during protests at the hospice where Terri Schiavo died.

By DONNA WINCHESTER
Published April 6, 2005

PINELLAS PARK - The crowds of protesters were gone. The orange fencing erected to contain them had been taken down. With the exception of a few TV camera crews still camped out on the north side of 102nd Avenue, the media had packed up and left.

And so life returned to normal Tuesday for 600 children who attend Cross Bayou Elementary School next to the hospice where Terri Schiavo died last week.

School officials decided to move the children to temporary locations March 26 after worrying that protesters from as far away as California were becoming emotional. For six days, the students attended school at the Gus A. Stavros Institute and Walsingham and Southern Oak elementary schools in Largo.

School staff including assistant principal Kathy Wickett greeted the children in front of the school Tuesday morning and welcomed them home.

"The parents and kids seemed very happy to be back," she said after the students were settled. "I wouldn't want to do this again, but it was nice to know we could handle it."

Robin Cade dropped off her 7-year-old son Dylan Couts just after the bell rang. Cade had gotten into the habit of bringing Dylan to school in the days leading up to the relocation when protesters were beginning to get unpredictable.

"Dylan was asking me, "Mom, why are all the police at my school?' " Cade said. "I told him they were just trying to keep the crowd under control."

She added: "I think they did the right thing to relocate the kids, but I'm glad to be back."

Not all parents were pleased with the move at first, Wickett said. They worried about where their children were being transported. They wondered if the teachers would continue to teach or if they would merely babysit. Close to 200 children were absent the first day, although attendance improved as the week progressed.

One parent sent an e-mail to the Pinellas Park Police Department the day the children were moved.

"Most of my daughter's friends did not attend the relocated school, nor did mine," Tammy Seigler wrote. "Our children deserve a positive environment, and there was no one thinking of them when all this mess started happening."

Wickett defended the district's decision to move the children, which came after extended discussions with local law enforcement.

"I think they were concerned there might be people who would have violent protests," she said. "They were concerned there were people who would come on the campus. We didn't want the children to be exposed to that on an up-close basis."

Of primary concern, she said, were students with special needs. The school serves children who are hearing and vision impaired as well as several medically fragile children who get tube feedings.

While the children were attending school off campus, guidance counselor Judy Jones visited their temporary classrooms to make sure they were okay. She read them a story called Alexander and the Terrible Thing about a little boy who went to sleep with gum in his mouth and woke up with it in his hair.

Some of the children had questions about the protesters, Jones said.

"We would explain, "There's someone next door who is very sick and might die. A lot of people don't want that to happen,' " she said. "We tried to be as caring and nurturing as possible."

Janessa Jannarone, who teaches hearing impaired children, said her students saw the move as an adventure.

"They never questioned it," she said. "We combined all three prekindergarten classes and did our regular activities."

Physical education teacher Linda Fairman said her students made friends while they were at Walsingham and Southern Oak.

"The kids taught us the Cotton-Eyed Joe - it's a dance - and we showed them the Cha Cha Slide," she said. "Out of adversity came a lot of positive relationships."

The children were nevertheless happy to return to their oak-shaded PE field, Fairman said.

"There's no place like home," she said, closing her eyes and clicking her heels together. "There's no place like home."

[Last modified April 6, 2005, 01:07:18]