The schools of Newtown, which stood empty in the wake of a shooting
rampage that took 26 of their own, are filled with the sounds of
students and teachers this morning as the bucolic Connecticut town
struggles to return to normal.
But among the normal sounds of a school day -- teachers reading to children, the scratch of pencil on paper -- students will hear new ones, including the murmur of grief counselors and the footsteps of police officers.
Four days after 20-year-old Adam Lanza strode into Sandy Hook Elementary school and gunned down a score of 6- and 7-year-olds, in addition to six faculty and staff, that school will remain closed. It is an active crime scene, with police coming and going past a line of 26 Christmas trees that visitors have decorated with ornaments, stuffed animals and balloons in the school colors of green and white as a memorial to the victims.
The massacre -- one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history, prompting some lawmakers to call for tighter restrictions on guns and causing school administrators around the country to assess their safety protocols.
Newtown police plan to have officers at the six schools that reopened Tuesday moring, trying to offer a sense of security to the students and faculty, many of whom spent the weekend in mourning. Newtown Police Lieutenant George Sinko acknowledged it may be difficult to ease the worries of the roughly 4,700 returning students and their families.
"Obviously, there's going to be a lot of apprehension. We just had a horrific tragedy. We had babies sent to school that should be safe and they weren't," Sinko said. "You can't help but think ... if this could happen again."
But among the normal sounds of a school day -- teachers reading to children, the scratch of pencil on paper -- students will hear new ones, including the murmur of grief counselors and the footsteps of police officers.
Four days after 20-year-old Adam Lanza strode into Sandy Hook Elementary school and gunned down a score of 6- and 7-year-olds, in addition to six faculty and staff, that school will remain closed. It is an active crime scene, with police coming and going past a line of 26 Christmas trees that visitors have decorated with ornaments, stuffed animals and balloons in the school colors of green and white as a memorial to the victims.
The massacre -- one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history, prompting some lawmakers to call for tighter restrictions on guns and causing school administrators around the country to assess their safety protocols.
Newtown police plan to have officers at the six schools that reopened Tuesday moring, trying to offer a sense of security to the students and faculty, many of whom spent the weekend in mourning. Newtown Police Lieutenant George Sinko acknowledged it may be difficult to ease the worries of the roughly 4,700 returning students and their families.
"Obviously, there's going to be a lot of apprehension. We just had a horrific tragedy. We had babies sent to school that should be safe and they weren't," Sinko said. "You can't help but think ... if this could happen again."
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