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Students Send Off Sept. 11 Tribute

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By D'ANN LAWRENCE WHITE

The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 10, 2008

RIVERVIEW - Her memories of Sept. 11, 2001, are a blur of confused images, sounds and smells.

Now 12 years old, Giunta Middle School student Elondra Snell was only 5 when she stood outside the police barricade on the streets of Manhattan with her mother, grandmother and aunt awaiting word of her uncle's fate following the attacks on the World Trade Center's twin towers.

Elondra and her family had been visiting relatives in New Jersey that day. Her uncle, Richard Jones, had already left for his job at the trade center when her stepfather turned on the television.

"My stepfather was watching the news and saw what happened to the twin towers," Elondra said. "They said some men were still trapped inside, so we got in the car and went to the city."

She said her memories of that day are sketchy. But her family often talks about what happened.

"The policeman told us that my uncle had checked into the twin towers and said, 'Let's hope he's alive,'" she said. "We waited a long time. I was hiding behind my mom and I was crying. My uncle was working at the bottom of the building and he was trapped under one of the desks. A firefighter used an ax and chopped up the desk to get him out. They brought my uncle out on a stretcher. He had cuts all over him but he was alive. I ran up and hugged him."

Now, whenever she visits her uncle, Elondra always asks to see a scar on his arm, a reminder of the injuries he suffered the day of the attacks. And she begs him to tell her the story of how the firefighter saved his life.

Although not all the students at Giunta were as directly affected by the events of Sept. 11, language arts and reading teacher Jose Berrios said all have memories of that day and understand they witnessed an important event in history.

That's why he has students create and sign remembrance banners that he sends to New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to display in front of city hall on the anniversary of the terror attacks each year.

It's a tradition he began while teaching at Mulrennan Middle School and brought to Giunta this year.

"Mr. Berrios wants to show the people of New York that everyone cares about what happened, that we haven't forgotten," said Giunta sixth-grader Christopher DeVelder.

Like Elondra, Berrios nearly lost a relative that day. His brother, Mickey Berrios, was a New York firefighter whose company was on the scene after the first plane struck.

"I wanted to teach the students about civic responsibility," Berrios said. "It also makes the students feel closer to history."

Each year Bloomberg has responded to the students' gesture with a thank-you note. Berrios makes copies of the notes for each student.

"It shows them that they can make an impact even from far away," Berrios said.

For Kaylee Schreier, 10, signing the banner brings her closer to a relative she barely remembers. Her 12-year-old cousin was helping his father work in a printing shop in the basement of one of the twin towers. He didn't make it out of the building alive.

"Now, on the anniversary of Sept. 11, we make little boats out of leaves and put my cousin's picture in them and sail them down the Alafia River to remember him," Kaylee said.

Reporter D'Ann Lawrence White can be reached at (813) 657-4524 or dlwhite@tampatrib.com.

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