Imagine a Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post Cover and it‘s Sequim High School! People smile, “That’s our school … we can go there for everything!”

Two women were coming in the school room and I was moving as quickly as I could to meet them at the doorway in the far corner. One woman was pushing a baby carriage and the other had a toddler in tow, so I arrived before they had advanced very far. I was surprised and shocked that this entourage would just enter my biology classroom. Then I saw it — they had brought a spider in a glass jar for me to identify.

This was only the first of several “drop in” visitors off the street, generally as harmless as the spider in the jar, although the delivery of a boa constrictor snake that someone found wandering around Dungeness was shocking!

Rooms in many of the high school buildings open directly to the outdoors. Because there is no extra space, many students wear their coats all day and keep a pile of belongings on the floor around themselves. This impedes quick movement around the room when dealing with emergencies.

As a retired teacher from the Sequim School District, I hope our community always will see their schools as the place “to go.” But Norman Rockwell doesn’t live in Sequim and it is terrifying to picture a different scenario as strangers enter our schools and classrooms.

Help make our students and teachers as safe as possible. Join me in voting YES to support Sequim Schools.

Shirley Anderson

Sequim