- Seaford Union Free School District
- Overview
Memorial Gives Seaford Students an Impactful History Lesson
With Seaford’s 9/11 memorial located directly outside of the high school, it served as an appropriate spot for discussions about an event that is history to today’s students, who were born in the years after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. To commemorate the 20th anniversary, many Seaford High School teachers brought their classes to the memorial on Sept. 10 to see the recovered piece of steel from the World Trade Center, the granite stones and the plaques in honor of the five graduates who died in the attacks – Thomas Haskell, Timothy Haskell, John Perry, Robert Sliwak and Michael Wittenstein.
“It’s important to commemorate those who sacrificed their lives,” social studies teacher Jenna Davis said.
Seaford’s memorial site honors all of the men and women who lost their lives in the attacks and have died in the years after from 9/11-related illnesses, as well as the first responders and rescue workers who answered the call to help in the aftermath. Ms. Davis noted that people see the impacts of that day differently as they get older and gain a greater understanding of what happened. She also said it is impactful for the students to go out to the memorial and learn how this affected people from their hometown.
It also sparked discussions in her classes on a wide range of issues. In human geography, students talked about how 9/11 changed American culture, while in her government class, they looked at the significance of federal holidays and discussed whether or not Sept. 11 should be one.
For a lesson on visual rhetoric, English teacher Tania Cintorino showed students covers of the New Yorker magazine from Sept. 24, 2001 as well as the one-year and 10-year anniversaries of the attacks. They discussed the messages that the artists were trying to convey. From there, students traveled to the Seaford memorial to look at its design and understand the symbolism of all of its different components.
Students then sat around the memorial plaza as Ms. Cintorino shared her recollections of the day, as the attacks occurred during her first September as a Seaford High School teacher. She noted the important of passing along these stories to the next generation. As the years have gone on, she went from having students who lived the attacks with her, to talking about it with those who weren’t even born.
“I share with them my own personal perspective, experience and memories,” she said. “Many have heard stories from their families, and it’s important to continue that conversation.”