Columbia High School was evacuated for 40-minutes during school hours today due to a “burning odor.” Principal Elizabeth Aaron wrote in an email message to parents and guardians (see below) that the Maplewood Fire Department determined the source “and the building was cleared our alarms were reset as per emergency procedures before we re-entered the building to resume our day.”
District spokeswoman Suzanne Turner added, “The odor was caused by the interaction between a supervised science experiment and our vent system. Students were evacuated as a precautionary measure, and were quickly readmitted to the building once the fire department confirmed there was no risk.”
From Principal Elizabeth Aaron:
Today we conducted 40-minute evacuation of our building due to a burning odor in several classrooms. The source was identified by Maplewood Fire Department members, and the building was cleared our alarms were reset as per emergency procedures before we re-entered the building to resume our day.
Please be aware and share with your students that in the event of an evacuation, we act on the premise of a ‘frozen’ schedule –that is, students stay with the teacher and class during and after the evacuation and re-entry until directed otherwise. Even if the time that passes would have moved students to lunch, a free period, or the end of their day, they are not excused. They remain with that teacher until further direction is given. This procedure is designed so that we may account for each and every student during an emergency.
We hope to see you this evening at Back to School Night.
Please join me for my remarks at 6:30 in the auditorium, after which we will ring a bell to move you to Period 1. (Should your student not have a Period 1 class, we ask that you remain in the auditorium until we ring the bell for Period 2). You will spend 10 minutes in each classroom, meeting and then hearing each of your student’s teachers talk about their goals for the year and how be engaged with us in the work we do at CHS.
Should you still need to return a lunch form, publicity release, or military contact opt-out form (all accessible under CHS forms on our website under “Student and Parent Resources”), we are happy to take those from you this evening.
Please take a few minutes to talk with your student about his or her progress so far this year as you fill out the schedule template we provided on the back of our letter sent home last week. We ask that you do this so that you have a sense of your students’ academic day here at CHS before going through it this evening.
Mr. Shannon, who teaches Project Adventure in our PE department, will not be here this evening. Please do not report to that class, and please click on the Dropbox link here to watch a short film made by several CHS students to learn more about that class.
https://www.somsd.k12.nj.us/
We will have students here to help direct you in our hallways this evening, and thank you for your support of our work and CHS. See you at 6:30!
Best regards,
Elizabeth Aaron
