Ms. Kerchner

I was living in San Francisco and teaching in Redwood City at the time of 9/11. I took the train to work and a friend picked me up. When I got in the car she said, "Did you hear what happened?" She told me that the World Trade Center had been hit by a plane. We were glued to the radio as we drove to school. I just remember being shocked. Our principal stated that we would still have school and just carry on with class. He instructed us not to play the news in class in front of the kids. I was teaching 3rd grade at the time and I remember a student arriving to class and he asked me, "Ms. Kerchner, did you see the plane hit the building?" The kids wanted to know who did it and they were scared. I just reassured them that we were in a safe place. I called my parents back home on the east coast and my dad was heading home because he worked in a Federal Building in Boston. (Federal Buildings were ordered to be evacuated as a precaution). I remember feeling so far away from the incident because not many of my co-workers had connections with people who lived in NYC or the east coast.