When I was in high school, every yearbook I received, had pictures of at least two people who had died in the summer, usually due to drunken driving.
My high school has about 2000 students. Once a year or so, someone dies in a car accident. Last year a student died of leukemia.
This past summer was pretty rough.
A rising junior, and his girlfriend, who had just graduated, died in a freak car accident that to this day has not been explained.
One of my good friends, a rising senior, committed suicide, also for no apparent reason.
I’ve never heard of so many deaths all at once here.
My aunt was a 2nd grade teacher. She died a few years ago of a brain aneurism. I usually try to control my emotions at funerals. (I know it’s stupid of me–but it’s the whole “men don’t cry” thing)
Anyway, I went to the funeral home for the viewing, and there was a big poster in the reception area. It was made by her students. They had each traced their little hands with a crayon and then written their name and a short message inside.
“We miss you, Mrs. Smith”
“We love you, Mrs. Smith”
“I’m sorry you’re gone, Mrs. Smith”
“Mrs. Smith is in Heaven.”
“I am sad without you, Mrs. Smith.”
I cried a river, standing there and looking at all the little hand outlines and thinking about those little kids trying to deal with the death of their teacher.
Ruffian, I’m so sorry. Please take care of yourself. It’s not easy to explain death to kids. 
I don’t think there were any deaths in my junior high svhool when I went there. Then when I went to senior high, there were no deaths in Gr. 11. In my Gr. 12 year, however, two people died in the same car accident. One of those guys left a girlfriend and young son behind.
I did hear that someone who used to go to my junior high school (who was a couple of grades above me) died in a car accident Then just a year and a half ago, his sister died of cancer… she’d been suffering from it for a couple of years.
When my brother was in Gr. 3 and my sister in Gr. 1, the elementary school secretary committed suicide by breathing in carbon monoxide in her car. During my sister’s Gr. 7 year, a girl in her class was killed by a car backing out of a driveway as she was biking by the house. She heard about it when her friends called her on the phone to tell her: the typical “Girl A told me that Girl B told her that Girl C told her that Girl D died…” stuff.
At my brother’s high school, there was an accident in the summer of 1998 (when he was going to go into Gr. 12 in September) that killed one girl. She was waiting at a bus stop when a car veered out of control and hit her. My brother vaguely knew this girl from chemistry class, and the next year at their grad ceremony, she was honored as having graduated. In 2001, a former schoolmate of my siblings was killed while diving.
These are just the ones I remember. I’m sure there are more deaths.
F_X
In sixth grade at my old school in North Carolina, a girl got hit by a car and died. That’s the only school death I’ve had. However, in a few months, my current grade (10) has had at least two car wrecks, but both with only mild injuries.
I’ve been lucky so far.
Becky Middleton and I sat beside each other in french class…gah that was hard.
There were two or three people each year who went to the same school who were killed in car accidents also.