“He will always deny it, but he is the very definition of a hero.” Schonauer is the most humble person I’ve ever known,” she said. “I couldn’t even practice it without getting overwhelmed, but it was the most liberating thing I’ve ever done,” she said.Īlthough Schonauer is uncomfortable with the word “hero,” there’s no doubt in Egenes’ mind that he stopped a tragedy. But during her freshman year in college, she gave a speech on it. For a long time, she didn’t want to talk about that day. She will graduate from Indiana Wesleyan University in April, with a degree in photography. Megan Egenes was in the classroom that day. My life changed drastically after that, and I know theirs did too.” “I think about how lucky we all are,” Schonauer said. That’s when the impact of that day hits him again. At 32, he and his wife, Kelsey (Williams) ’13, have a 16-month-old daughter and are expecting another girl in June.Īlthough the students who were in the classroom that day are in their early 20s now, he still gets emails from them, telling them they graduated from college, they’re getting married, starting careers. Seven years later, Schonauer is still teaching and coaching at Normal Community High School. No one had been injured.ĭerrick Schonauer still teaches at Normal Community High School seven years after the life-changing incident. Schonauer grabbed the gun, and he and another student subdued the boy until police arrived. Although they were two desks apart, when the boy set down the gun for a second, the teacher made his move. Schonauer never took his eyes off the student. The students who escaped fled to locker rooms, classrooms, anywhere they could hide. Then he told them, ”That’s not going to happen again,” as he lined them up against the wall and took their phones. He fired into the ceiling and slammed the door. He asked everyone to give her a hug, and when the students moved toward her, several ran out of the room so quickly they left their sandals behind. Inside his backpack, the student had two more guns, hatchets, ammunition, and a canteen of accelerant.Ī girl near the door started crying, and the boy said he was not going to hurt her. “There were multiple opportunities for him to do harm.” “I think it was more a cry for help,” Schonauer said. The minutes went by in slow motion, as the boy told the class about his struggles, his rough transition to high school, and how he had been bullied. Schonauer also dialed 911 but knew he couldn’t speak. That teacher, however, didn’t have his phone with him, so he didn’t see the text. Reaching for his cell phone, the teacher quietly texted another teacher that there was a gun in the classroom. Schonauer had a relationship with the student because he happened to student teach at his middle school. Schonauer tried to calm the gun-wielding student, assuring him they were his friends and they were listening. My life changed drastically after that, and I know theirs did too.”-Derrick Schonauer He told the class of about 30 students that he wanted them to listen to his story, as he pulled out a handgun. On September 7, 2012, there were only a few minutes left in the first-hour health class when a freshman grabbed the teacher’s stool and said it was his class now. On the same day he interviewed at Normal Community High School, he was hired. A month earlier, he was working for an apartment rental company, still looking for his first teaching job when he got a call about a last-minute opening. But then a bullet dropped to the floor.ĭerrick Schonauer ’12 shouldn’t have been teaching health education on that rainy day in September, only 12 days into the school year. At first the teacher didn’t think the gun the student drew from his backpack was real.
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