On the morning of September 11th, 2001, millions of people across America were glued to the T.V. in shock as the Twin Towers fell. Nobody will be able to forget where they were and what they were doing. WSPN talked to teachers about their memories of that morning.

Scott Parseghian, Dean of Students:This is Coach P, Dean of Students at Wayland High School. 9/11, I remember exactly where I was. I was teaching Health Education class at Wayland Middle School, and at that time, the 8th grade house leader, Mrs. Scully, came into my classroom, pulled me out, and I had to go back and teach in a minute. But absolutely, I remember where I was that day. I think a lot like our parents talk about when JFK was assassinated, they remember exactly where they were. I remember where I was for 9/11 and when the Challenger blew up.

Eva Urban, history teacher:I had a student bust in, and he said to me,‘Mr. Sylvester,’ who was my department chair, ‘wanted me to tell you that a plane has just hit the World Trade Center.’ And here I am, I’m from Colorado originally, and I’m like what’s the World Trade Center? And then I was like, ‘Wow, what a horrible accident. I’m very sorry that happened.’ That’s all I could think to say, you know, and then I continued teaching about the Civil War. And then another student showed up with a television. Contemplating what the heck was going on, we, live, watched the second plane hit, and it was clearly a plane, hit the second tower at 9:03. And it was at that point, that we began to freak out a little bit, and really think about the fact that this was not an accident. Because the first one, you’re like, that’s a horrible accident, and then , the second one, when that hits, it’s not an accident anymore. And the media immediately jumped on this, and they said this is not an accident, we are under attack, and this is a terrorist attack. And we were, at that point, very very scared. But I still had it together at that point, right? I still had it together. We’re contemplating this horrific act, there’s smoke coming out everywhere, and then, we begin to see the very graphic images of people jumping, that didn’t want to burn to death, that chose instead to fall. And we began to see these kinds of images, and we’re really, I think it’s like this shock and awe and horror. Before it was all said and done, my classroom was absolutely packed full of teenagers.

By 9:37, we had heard that a second plane, or a third plane had struck the Pentagon. And at that point, we were scared. Because when you know that this was a carefully orchestrated attack, you don’t know what the next thing is that is going to get hit. We were pretty sure it wasn’t Pentucket High School, right? But what could it have been? You name it, the Sears Tower, the Mall of America, Mount Rushmore, Disney Land, you have no idea, you have no idea what’s going to get hit next, but you know something is going to get hit.

So the Pentagon takes the impact of another plane, and now we were scared, very upset, people were asking me like I know the answers, I had no idea. But at this point, when I saw the South Tower collapsing, I started to cry. And it was an interesting phenomenon because I knew, as I think many people at that point really weren’t thinking about, that thousands of people were dying horrific deaths at that very moment, when you see this thing go down, at that very moment, and you’re powerlessly watching this, and it’s pure pandemonium and terror. And it was interesting because I found my students comforting me at that point.

Jessica Imbornone, science teacher: My name is Jessica Imbornone, and I was teaching at a high school in Pittsburgh during 9/11, and the school at which I taught had televisions in every classroom, so as soon as we found out news about the first tower being hit, all the classrooms in the school basically turned the televisions on, and the students as well as the teachers watched the televisions all day long. And I just remember it being a very emotional and frightening day.

Robin Fitch, English teacher: Hi, my name is Ms. Fitch, I’m in the English department at Wayland High School. On September 11th, the morning of, I was in my apartment on the Upper West Side of New York, getting ready for my first day of student teaching. It was actually on the east side, and I never made it. I just sat in front of the television and eventually went out for a walk.

Erin Dalbec, Media Center Director: This is Mrs. Dalbec, and on September 11th, I was actually on Boylston Street, and I was working for a production company. And I was a casting assistant, and we were casting for Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. And it was so strange because this was one of those blow off gigs for me and just asking people stupid questions to get them to audition for me, and people started kind of coming out on to the street with very worried looks on their faces. And Boylston Street is downtown Boston which is, you know, near the Prudential Center, so there were very high buildings everywhere.

And so everyone looked very very worried and panicked and people were crying, and I was still kind of working, and my producer had me working, and I was trying to figure out what was going on. And then finally, I asked people, and then I was worried, but I was kind of conflicted because I was trying to figure out if I should still be working or if I should be feeling this whole situation, and so finally, after about an hour and going back and forth and then watching news reports and going into a hotel and just huddling around a television with the rest of the people that were downtown, I went home and basically watched television. And finally my husband came home, and he was working downtown also. I’m actually pretty emotional about it because it was very upsetting that day, so yeah, that’s where I was on 9/11.

This story is part of a series, Ten Years Later, about the tenth anniversary of 9/11.