Condolences to Cape community in wake of death

The following commentary was sent to Nikki Miller, principal of Cape Henlopen High School, with a copy submitted to the Cape Gazette for publication.

Allow me, as a school administrator retired from both suburban and urban school districts in the Northeast, to offer condolences to you and your staff upon this sad occasion of the death by auto of one of your students. I shall not dwell upon or even mention the beautiful young lady and her accomplishments thus far in life since everybody else is doing that. I shall deal with you as a fellow administrator and losing a student, any student.  In my recent book, I mentioned the one thing I never wanted to experience as a school leader was the loss of a student.  Such, unfortunately, did occur when I was a superintendent in New Jersey.  The details are irrelevant; the 14-year-old died.

No matter what the cause, you, your staff, and your students shall feel this loss for a very long time, no matter how efficient the counseling.  Part of your school has been taken from all of you, never to return.  There are so many things your former student shall not experience, including the new multimillion-dollar wing.

As you all grieve together with parents and community, we have to keep in mind that regardless of ZIP code or environment, we are all somehow bound to lose one or more of our children. We shall all hug and tell stories of the deceased, a person who left us all too soon, and ponder “what ifs.”  And there shall be so many “what ifs” including did I do enough with regard to vehicular safety, regardless of the type of vehicle, whether pedaled or motorized? There is no need to second-guess, or self loathe, Madam Principal.

In the words of Robin Williams in the movie “Good Will Hunting,” “It’s not your fault.”  It is not anybody’s fault - stuff happens!  Good stuff happens; bad stuff happens. All stuff happens.

In our urban schools and school districts, we administrators live in fear of which one of our kids may be shot over any given weekend; in the suburbs, cause of death tends to be usually vehicular.  In case you are wondering, the cause of death of the student during my career was medical, a heart attack, because he was black and poor, and had not been able to have been afforded preventative medical attention. That is neither here nor there; a bullet would have entered one of my other students in that district eventually, in the same way a vehicle was almost the cause of death for my wealthier white children in one of the burbs I administered. It is heart-wrenching in all cases; these are children.

So, my dear Principal Nikki, condolences are proffered to all the Cape educational community on this very sad occasion with true hopes that such does not happen in the future, although, we know just due to that challenging law of averages, a similar tragedy shall occur. 

Certainly, the children shall be a little more careful, and aware, having now lost one of their own, and the parents will be much more careful and directive, but some bad stuff will return.

However, there will be more good occurring in the future than bad, and we await that…for example, an actual graduation ceremony in June, a ribbon cutting of the new wing, the number of births at Beebe increasing the population. You, too, shall be an even better administrator having experienced the loss of this (or any) student. 

You shall be forever changed, and I guarantee the event shall affect you in ways unseen and unforeseen. Again, I offer condolences.