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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