Twenty-four hours after tragedy struck Watson Chapel Junior High School, Barbara Varnell was back in her classroom with a method for dealing with the aftermath.
"You've got to find joy in the small things," Varnell said Tuesday. "As we get through this, you've got to look for every little bit of light. Today, there's not very much light. But if we get to laugh about something, if we get to see a smile from someone -- three people have come by and hugged or prayed over me."
A minister, a fellow preacher and an administrator from another building, Varnell named, came by to check on her and other faculty members rocked by a shooting on their own campus that has left a 15-year-old male student in very serious condition and a fellow 15-year-old behind bars at Jack Jones Juvenile Detention Center. Prosecutors are expected to determine by today whether to charge the suspect as a juvenile or adult.
Junior high students went into virtual learning Tuesday and will remain home today, Watson Chapel School District Superintendent Jerry Guess said, adding school Principal Uyolanda Wilson made the request.
"I talked to Dr. Guess and told him, let's take 'temperature-checks.' Let's see where people are," Wilson said. "We want to talk to our staff. We have to make sure they're ready to receive students. We want to know how our kids feel about it."
Students on other district campuses are attending in-person classes after two weeks of virtual learning due to snowstorm-related issues.
"We had quite a few high school students out, but classes will be on the high school campus [today] and we hope they all will come back," Guess said. Watson Chapel High School is located just to the south of the junior high campus.
Aftermath
The last 24 hours have not been easy on Varnell, a mother of children ages 30, 13 and 11 and a grandmother of two.
"Broken," she said, when asked how she was doing. "Off and on, I was pretty much in control of it until I got to my driveway. My kids weren't home yet, but the fact that I got to pull back in my driveway -- and I know every woman and man hiding in this room with babies, while we're sitting here praying and waiting for the police to come and make it OK -- we just wanted to get home."
The shooting occurred in a hallway down from the school's main office. Pine Bluff Police received a call at 9:59 a.m. and arrived on scene three minutes later, Police Chief Kelvin Sergeant said Monday. Law enforcers from other agencies assisted.
"When we left to go home yesterday, it was a relief to drive into my driveway and know I get another chance to be somebody's mama and somebody's grandma again," Varnell said, her voice softening. "That's when I pretty much lost it."
Wilson also stopped by Varnell's classroom. After a few minutes of sharing her feelings, Varnell received another hug from the principal, closing her eyes in a brief moment of respite from the grief.
"Mrs. Wilson is the only reason I came back to school today," Varnell said.
'In a dark place'
Grief counselors and local ministers were on hand to support faculty members Tuesday.
"We've had parents even come today to talk with some of our counselors because their children were here," Wilson said. "They saw it, and it was devastating. They need that release as well -- that support, rather."
Wilson -- who's in her 20th year on the faculty and "either" her third or fourth as principal -- described how her staff is handling the aftermath of a tragedy that's trended at an alarming rate in America over the past 25 years.
"We are ... in a dark place," the soft-spoken Wilson said, taking a long pause. "And I say that because our teachers are, they're just having difficulty. We're all having difficulty. We all say when we see it on the news, when it's another school, usually in a bigger city or somewhere far away, we have a tendency to say or to think, 'Oh, that will never happen here.' You know, 'We're too close-knit' or, 'We're a small town and we know everybody, and that sort of thing would never happen here.' But the reality is, it did. And, we struggle. We absolutely struggle."
As for her own well-being, Wilson said: "I'm OK. Not great, but I'm OK."
Wilson also said she talked with the victim's mother shortly after the shooting and again Tuesday morning, addressing rumors none of the school officials had reached out to the mom.
"When we called [Monday], Dr. Guess was here and he spoke with her," Wilson said. That call was made as law enforcers arrived on the scene, she said.
Wilson said she and her staff reviewed the events of Monday and talked about a "current reality" as well as a need to express thoughts and feelings. She credited Bessie Lancelin, with the Southeast Arkansas Behavioral Healthcare System, with helping teachers to communicate with students about the shooting.
"We have a network of people here, and it really is a family," Varnell said. "I know that's a cliche, but it really is a family at Watson Chapel. All night [Monday], we were getting calls from people from other buildings, people from other school districts, people from White Hall and Dollarway reaching out, saying 'What can they do to help us?'"
Protocol
Although the suspect was not considered an active shooter because he did not shoot at random, the school and law enforcers went into active shooter protocol, Sergeant said.
The protocol on Wilson's campus is known as Code Black.
"It's something all teachers know," Wilson said. "They know how to plan and prepare for it because we practice that. Because it was in transition, we still had kids in the hallway, and so we said again, 'Code Black. This is not a drill.' And, at that point, we start locking down. The teachers start locking down. The few that's starting to come on campus, we start directing those to a safe place. The nurse is there to assist the scene. By now, all of the first responders have been called. Everybody had been called. So, we now are trying to make sure our students are secure. Until Pine Bluff PD or Jefferson County Sheriff's [deputies] get here. Once they get here, they take over the scene."
Two officers, whom Guess said are employed by the district, were on campus at the time of the shooting. Sergeant said more officers would be made available when the students returned to campus.
Wilson said she and Guess talked about hiring off-duty officers and "being vigil" when asked about possible additional safety measures.
"Everybody is at a heightened sense of alertness, and that's where we need to remain from this point on," Wilson said.
Supporting the kids
Jarrett Franklin, 25, said he had a completely different plan for his life before becoming a science teacher, but he followed a calling that led him to the Watson Chapel faculty almost two years ago.
Since then, the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff graduate from Marion has used his youth and science knowledge to help younger ones navigate a society faced with numerous challenges ranging from the coronavirus to social issues. Monday's shooting was another unwanted challenge, and Franklin was at his laptop either teaching someone virtually or communicating by email with others who needed their voices heard.
"First and foremost, being my true authentic self was the biggest lesson I learned during my first year in the changeover from Christmas to the new year starting January 2020, being my true authentic self, being upfront with them about my past, things I struggled with, things I've seen growing up with people I grew up with who dealt with a lot of the same things I dealt with," he said.
Franklin said he dealt with depression growing up and saw people choose paths different from his. He said he encourages students, especially boys, not to wait until it's too late to change for the better.
Talking about the shooting has been the best coping mechanism for Franklin, he believes.
"As it was happening, I was angry," he said. "I had kids around me in the nurse's office, so I had to keep it together for them, and I did the only thing I really knew how to do, and that was ... I prayed. I prayed out loud and I called on the name of the Lord. Then I gathered myself and talked to the kids, and I let them know to be calm, text their people and let them know they're going to be OK and not to do anything that might escalate anything, because I had one of the boys in [class] who was very close to the victim."
Franklin told his family he was unsure whether he would report to campus Tuesday, but he did, feeling his students needed him.
"I've been reaching out to a good amount of them," Franklin said. "I had a few show up [virtually] ... well, one. I've been talking to a few through email and other various lines of communication. But I've just been letting them know I'm here for them, and if they need to talk or anything, I'm giving them space to do so. I'm not worried about how it sounds, but letting them have that release, I think that's important."
Varnell still gets to network with students as she supports teachers and visits with some of them on a one-on-one basis.
"Sometimes when kids need a different place to sit down because they need to decompress, they send them in here, too," she said. "I'm like an auntie. ... I focus on the curriculum side of it, but I do love on the babies, and I keep them close to my heart -- not always the grown-ups, but definitely the babies."
For a third week in a row -- never mind the ills of the past year -- those "babies" and their city are faced with a disruption to everyday school life.
Snowstorms, although enjoyable to many, kept classes from gathering in-person and made traveling through Pine Bluff and all of Arkansas treacherous. The cold weather then weakened an entire city water system and limited the flow of water to schools, homes and other establishments, causing campuses to close for fear of sanitation problems.
At Watson Chapel Junior High, students and faculty members alike are searching for light in a dark place.
"This is a small town. People say Pine Bluff is a big, scary urban town," Varnell said. "It is a small town with groups of community families, so we're going to find the good and work through all the rough stuff, because there are still rough things to be felt and dealt with, if every day gets a little more light and a little more good until you work through it all."
