Middle School Students Share Letters with Victims of Hurricane Harvey

After Hurricane Harvey hit the Southwest, all 215 Middle School students watched a video about the floods in Texas.  Simultaneously, we had some guided discussions on empathy and compassion. We then wrote letters to Middle School students who lived in the area most deeply impacted by Hurrican Harvey. Yesterday, the principal of Riverwood Middle School sent me the email below. Today's assembly gave me a moment to read this letter aloud to our community. It lifted my spirits, I hope it does the same for you.

Nancy,

I wanted you to know that I received all of the letters from your students today.  I must say that they truly made my day!  I am so excited to share them with our students here at RMS in their English Language Arts classes.

We had over 230 of our students that had their homes flooded here in our area. Additionally, 6 of our teachers also had their homes flood.  If our students and staff  did not have their own home flood, most of them had an aunt, uncle, grandparent or close friend that did flood.  We have families living in each other's homes, living with relatives, some in temporary apartments and even hotels and trailers.  Most of them did not have flood insurance as they were not supposed to be in a flood plain.

It has been a very challenging semester for many of our families.  The high school that the majority of our students go into after they leave us was completely destroyed and is still not in use.  All told, the estimates of the damages in our school district are approaching 100 million dollars from what I understand.

Needless to say, your letters come at a great time as we head into the Holiday break.  Please thank your very thoughtful students for all their well wishes and prayers.  I read many of their letters and could feel the compassion and empathy in their writing.  It is students and schools like yours that have helped lift us up this year when we really needed a boost.  

With sincerest gratitude and appreciation,

Donnie Bodron
Principal, Riverwood MS