Woburn Students Offer Support To Florida School Struck By Tragedy

WOBURN, MA -- Some of the support going to students and teachers at Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, FL is coming from Woburn Memorial High School in the form on big manilla envelopes stuffed with letters from students at the school. At least two English teachers -- Jen Barry and Sarah Hanson -- gave students class time to write letters to students at the Florida school, where 17 people were killed by a gunman earlier this month.

"Many of letters that I read through were really touching and just reinforced the fact that we do have awesome kids here at WMHS- even the ones who can sometimes be a disruption really are kind-hearted," Barry said "Sometimes, it is worth taking a minute to teach these kinds of lessons for these are the best lessons they can learn... walking in someone else's shoes, having empathy, and realizing that small acts of kindness can mean a lot."

Assistant Principal Ed Macguire ha received contact information for a teacher at Stoneman Douglas seeking letters of support for her students from around the country. Macguire passed it along to English teachers and on Monday, Barry's freshmen and Hanson's sophomores and seniors wrote letters to students who had survived the Florida attack.

In her request, Ms. Wolk-Rogers, the Florida teacher, said she wanted to greet the students with the letters when classes resume at the school. She set one ground rule in her request: no emails. "Not the email kind or the texting kind but real letters handwritten and signed by kids from our amazing community. I want them to hold the envelopes addressed from around the world to see that they are not alone and there is still kind and caring people in this world," Wolk-Rogers wrote.

Wolk-Rogers didn't set a deadline for when letters need to be sent. Her address is Ms. Wolk-Rogers, Stoneman Douglas High School, 5901 Pine Island Road, Parkland, Florida 33076.

Barry is an English teacher at heart: she was particularly pleased when she saw students reference a book they are currently reading.

"It did make my heart happy- especially when some of them used quotes and made references to lightness and darkness in A Tale of Two Cities, which we are currently reading," she said.

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Photo by Jen Barry.

Dave Copeland can be reached at dave.copeland@patch.com or by calling 617-433-7851. Follow him on Twitter (@CopeWrites) and Facebook (/copewrites).