The author's faith in America is restored by the act of children in San Francisco collecting pennies for the relief of the victims of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

September 11th was a horrible day. As the radio woke me up that early morning, I heard the news announcer say, "WOW! A weather plane has hit the Twin Towers in New York City. More news at 7 am."

As I showered and got dressed, the announcer broke into the music and said, "It was a commercial jet that hit the World Trade Center!" My wife and I turned on the TV and watched CNN, called family and friends, and told them the news. I said goodbye to my wife and left for school. During the five-minute ride, more details came on the radio. Things were happening. Events were out of control. (It reminded me of what happened during the crisis of the 1989 earthquake we had in San Francisco.)

As the faculty and staff arrived at school, they went to watch the reports on TV in the Library. The school phones never stopped ringing. Parents were calling, keeping kids home, or asking us to send them home. The second crash erupted on the TV screen. The news from Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania unfolded. America was under attack!

News came to close the school and get the students home for the day. Then we heard that downtown San Francisco was being evacuated. People were told to return to their homes. Rumors flew that the Bay Area was a target.

At school, an emergency staff meeting took place, staff roles were assigned, students were reunited with their families and returned to their homes. Staff members were also sent home. The school was locked up. I, like the rest of America, went home to wait and wonder. What was happening to our nation, to those people in Washington, New York, and Pennsylvania? The nation watched CNN, NBC, ABC, and FOX late into the night. We watched our President, we heard his words, we offered our prayers, we cried for our countrymen, and, like other American's in past national emergencies, we resolved to help.

As I drove to school on September 12th, I, as principal of Visitacion Valley Middle School, thought about what to say to the staff. How could I help them to explain this horror, this evil, to our students. How could we help our students understand what had happened in the past 24 hours? What would we, as adults, do to get things back under control? How would we make us all once more safe and free from fear?

Again the staff gathered in the early morning, and a plan for the day emerged. We would start our day at the flagpole in the school's play yard. The entire school body and the staff would assemble. Our student body president would lower the flag to half-mast, and we would say the "Pledge of Allegiance." I would explain what that meant, what our flag represented to us all. We would, all 550 middle school students and staff, hold hands and in silence reflect upon the events of the day before.

We all then reported to an extended advisory period. There, we discussed the facts that had been learned, dispelled the myths, communicated our thoughts to each other and, hopefully, relieved the fear as to what was happening to our country. As a unifying activity, the student council asked the students to bring their pennies to school the next day. The collection would be sent to our local San Francisco firehouse. These firefighters would be able to pass along the collected pennies to the firefighters in New York City to help in some small way those who needed help and support.

Someone asked, "Why have the students bring in pennies?" The answer was simple, "Kids have pennies."

Two days later, the students had collected 14 gallons of pennies along with nickels, dimes, quarters, and dollars. A special school-wide assembly was held, patriotic songs were sung, poems were read, and four San Francisco Fire Department firefighters, dressed in their turn-out gear, unsure of what they were about to receive, came into the school auditorium and up to the stage. Upon the presentation of the penny collection by the officers of the student body, the firefighters were overcome. They looked at the faces of all those students and realized that they represented the power of America.

Students, staff, parents, and firefighters then sang "God Bless America," and the firefighters picked up their heavy load. They later called the school to report that $695.00, the sum of the pennies collected, was on its way to assist those who needed our help.

For the students of Visitacion Valley Middle School in San Francisco, the lesson that every penny counts is a solid concept. Seventy percent of our students come from homes at or below poverty level. They gave what they had to give to our national cause. Their contribution, spiritually as well as financially, showed that these students had become a part of our great American society. They had contributed to our national cause and were doing what Americans all over our land were doing, what we have always done in this country during a time of crisis-coming together and moving forward as a united people.

What are you doing with your pennies?

James S. Dierke is a Life Member of the San Francisco Scottish Rite Bodies, a member of Islam Shrine Temple in San Francisco, and a Past Master of San Francisco's Phoenix Lodge No. 144, where he is now the Lodge Historian. He previously contributed three articles to the Scottish Rite Journal.