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Nicole Ogburn teaches the new tool she will use this year to assess the emotional state of her students.
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Nicole Ogburn teaches the new tool she will use this year to assess the emotional state of her students.
Veronica G. Cardenas for NPR
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From the entrance, Nicole Ogburn’s fourth-grade classroom appears bright and unassuming.
The new colored JanSport backpacks hang from small chairs. Blue and white desks with dry-erase surfaces are clustered around the classroom. A green bookcase filled with rows of books is surrounded by bean bags and plush cushions.
This year, as Ogburn prepares her class, her first priority isn’t the decorations she usually chooses over the summer. Instead, she is buying things to help her students, and herself, feel more confident in the classroom.
“I bought something that gets stuck under the door so they can’t open the door. I bought a curtain to pull down so that I can’t see in my door if something was going on,” Ogburn said. “We have been thinking about more security this year instead of ‘how nice will my stay be?'”
Ogburn is preparing for her first year as a teacher in a newly refurbished campus space called Uvalde Elementary School. For seven years, Ogburn taught at Robb Elementary. The school closed after the mass shooting in May that killed 19 students and two teachers. Ogburn, her co-teacher and her students survived and escaped from a window in her classroom with the help of the police.
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A campus corridor repurposed for Uvalde students.
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A campus corridor repurposed for Uvalde students.
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In Nicole Ogburn’s classroom there are new backpacks with school supplies for each student.
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In Nicole Ogburn’s classroom there are new backpacks with school supplies for each student.
Veronica G. Cardenas for NPR
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Although Uvalde’s established independent school district and state leaders did announced new security measuresthe district has come under pressure from parents and other community members to provide greater transparency and demonstrate its ability to keep students safe at school.
Ogburn explained that he believes progress has been made, although improvements take time.
“We are working to be safe and I think everything will be fine on the first day of school, but it won’t be 100% done,” he warned. “But it’s in progress.”
While thinking about physical security measures, he also tried to anticipate what it would be like when the students returned to class for the first time since the May 24 shooting.
“I think I’m afraid of how some of these guys will react when they get here, and if I’m able to handle that part,” he said.
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Ogburn prepares for a very different school year in Uvalde.
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Ogburn prepares for a very different school year in Uvalde.
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The repurposed campus, called Uvalde Elementary School.
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The repurposed campus, called Uvalde Elementary School.
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This year she added a feature to her class to help her students express and manage their feelings. He is a black banner asking students to answer a question: How do you feel? Each student has their own marker to cut out, and each day Ogburn and his co-teacher plan to encourage students to place their marker alongside a corresponding sentiment such as “ready to learn”, “confused” or “angry”.
“I’m thinking, okay, what if this happens today and the whole class is feeling anxious or upset? There is no way to give a lesson.” “We have to understand … how are we going to calm them, how are we going to improve it?”
Ogburn is also worried about herself.
She said she wanted to get through the year “without being a complete emotional mess” as she works to manage her grief, most notably the deaths of her fellow fourth-grade teachers, Eva Mireles and Irma Garcia.
For several years at Robb, Ogburn and his co-teacher Trisha Albarado taught in the classroom alongside Mireles and Garcia.
“It was already hard not to have my two friends here with us, but having my co-teacher with me helped a lot,” she said. “Because we both said, if you don’t come back, I won’t come back. If we’re not together, we’ll fight to be together. Because we can’t do it without each other right now.”
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Stuffed animals and other objects are found in the makeshift memorial dedicated to the victims of the mass shooting.
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Stuffed animals and other objects are found in the makeshift memorial dedicated to the victims of the mass shooting.
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Ogburn shows off his “Uvalde Strong” bracelets.
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Ogburn shows off his “Uvalde Strong” bracelets.
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After the shooting, Ogburn added that he received treatment for depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as other surviving teachers. She said what she heard and saw that day is something he will remember for the rest of his life.
“Every day, there may be something that triggers an emotion that I don’t want to have that day,” he stressed. “And right now, every day is a constant reminder, because wherever I go, it’s right in front of my face.”
He hardly even went back to class. But she thought of his children, as well as of Uvalde’s students.
“I thought, first I have to go back and show them that we can’t live in fear. I mean, you never know when something will happen,” he added. “So I thought, I have to try not to live with that fear. I have to go ahead and show these guys, okay, if Mrs. Ogburn can go back to school, then I can too.”
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Angel wings, pinwheels and a white tablecloth are displayed at the entrance where the killer entered Robb Elementary School in May.
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Angel wings, pinwheels and a white tablecloth are displayed at the entrance where the killer entered Robb Elementary School in May.
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Gaby Olivares and Yvette Benavides Texas Public Radio They translated this article.
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