{"id":397041,"date":"2026-09-11T16:54:21","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T16:54:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/397041\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T16:54:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T16:54:21","slug":"pinellas-students-honor-9-11-victims-and-first-responders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/397041\/","title":{"rendered":"Pinellas students honor 9\/11 victims and first responders"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Twenty-five years after the 9\/11 attacks, a group of Pinellas County fourth- and fifth-graders is learning about a day they never experienced through art.<\/p>\n<p>Students from several local schools created artwork honoring the victims and first responders who lost their lives in the attacks. Their work is being displayed during a 9\/11 remembrance ceremony at 10 a.m. Friday at Curlew Hills Memorial Gardens in Palm Harbor.<\/p>\n<p>For fourth-graders at Ozona Elementary School, 9\/11 is history rather than a personal memory. Their teachers are using the art project to help students understand the significance of an event that changed the country.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe thought, let\u2019s bring two classes together for each collage and each student is gonna make their own print&#8230; and just create a whole community artwork,\u201d said Elizabeth Keller, an Ozona Elementary art teacher.<\/p>\n<p>This year marks the 10th year that Keller has worked with Curlew Hills on the project. The 25th anniversary inspired students to take a different approach.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">25 years after the 9\/11 attacks, a group of Pinellas 4th- and 5th-graders is learning about a day they never experienced through art. Their work is being displayed during a 9\/11 remembrance ceremony Friday at Curlew Hills Memorial Gardens in Palm Harbor. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/BSnBk7XgXD\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/t.co\/BSnBk7XgXD<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/JvG0eP2TiF\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/JvG0eP2TiF<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Spectrum Bay News 9 (@BN9) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/BN9\/status\/2098380047434281465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">September 11, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Students carved their own designs into printing plates and used ink to create dozens of individual images. More than 80 custom prints were then combined into two large collages \u2014 one centered on the number 25 and another featuring the American flag.<\/p>\n<p>Some students chose to focus their artwork on the people who made the ultimate sacrifice.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can honor those who died in it, in 9-11,\u201d fourth-grader Quinn Stauffer said.<\/p>\n<p>Fourth-grader Zoe Swartzkopf said she was surprised to learn how many firefighters died while responding to the attacks.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI didn\u2019t know that 343 firefighters risked their lives,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I\u2019m just really grateful that I get to do this project.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Classmate Carter Currier said the events of 9\/11 changed the country forever.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt happened so long ago, and it was just bad that it even happened,\u201d Currier said. \u201cIt changed America forever.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The student artwork will be displayed during Friday\u2019s ceremony, giving children who have never known a world without the 9\/11 attacks a way to help preserve the memory of those who died and those who responded.<\/p>\n<p>The featured speaker is Genelle Guzman-McMillan, who survived after being trapped in the rubble of the World Trade Center for 27 hours. She was the last known survivor rescued from the wreckage.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the art projects, local schools participated in an essay contest. The winning student will be announced during the ceremony and will have an opportunity to read the winning essay.<\/p>\n<p>The first-place winner will receive $500, while the second-place winner will receive $250.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 Twenty-five years after the 9\/11 attacks, a group of Pinellas County fourth- and fifth-graders&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":397042,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[767,274,770,28,2635,115,596,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,278,835],"class_list":["post-397041","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-community","tag-app-top-stories","tag-community-news","tag-florida","tag-jason-lanning","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397041","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=397041"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397041\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/397042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=397041"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=397041"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=397041"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}