NYC leaders announce $1 million investment in 9/11 educational programming for students
New York City Council members gathered at ground zero on Thursday morning to announce an investment in how future generations learn about the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
Leaders were outside the Oculus to detail what they described as a significant investment in 9/11 educational programming for students.
That $1 million in new funding is being rolled out in partnership with the 9/11 Memorial & Museum. The funds will pay for field trips for city students with a focus on eighth graders. It will also provide virtual trips, cover professional development for teachers, and support other programs.
Teacher Vaughan Danvers said she has a special duty to teach students what happened, but the classroom doesn't do it justice. She said it's important to bring them to the museum.
"It transforms a lesson into a lifetime memory," Danvers said. "I still hear from former students who remember the trip vividly. They remember the firefighters who rode toward the flames, the recovery workers who marked that sacred column, and the realization that this happened to regular people just like them.
"Let me tell you, nothing, nothing compares to seeing a student's face when they stand in that space. It's not just history to them anymore. It becomes real. It becomes human," she added.
Danvers said the museum's digital learning experience helps bring the same experience to kids across the city and country who can't make it in person.
"We are united in remembrance, no matter the distance," she said.
Council Speaker Julie Menin said there's a need to help people understand what happened during the attacks. For her, the vow to never forget is personal. She lived in Lower Manhattan, and her restaurant was heavily damaged when the towers fell.
"I want them to know the sense of unity and the simple acts of kindness, compassion, and heroism that existed on that day. Our city was so unified in the weeks and months after 9/11. We need to get back to that unity," Menin said. "We want to, of course, remember the lives of the tragic loss. We want remember the heroic acts of the first responders and strangers who helped one another during one of the most difficult times our city has ever faced."
Menin has also procured $4 million so the Department of Investigation can complete a report on the environmental toxins at ground zero that caused so many illnesses.
Beth Hillman, the president and CEO of the 9/11 Memorial & Museum, said 100 million Americans weren't born during 9/11 or are too young to remember the tragedy.
"Every student in New York City schools, whether pre-K or high school, was born after the 9/11 attacks. That makes our work to educate the next generation of Americans and our New Yorkers so important," she said.
Following the event, city officials marked 25 years since the attack with a wreath-laying ceremony to honor the nearly 3,000 people killed.
This comes as remembrance events are already underway across the city.
On Wednesday, 36 new names of those who died from 9/11-related illnesses were added to the FDNY's World Trade Center Memorial Wall in Brooklyn.
And at Ladder 6 in Chinatown, firefighters reunited with the family of Josephine Harris, the survivor they carried down Stairwell B of the North Tower.
More events are planned for the coming days, including an art installation at St. Paul's Chapel, which survived unscathed from the attack. There, 2,977 hand-folded paper cranes will be on display, representing every person killed on Sept. 11.
