A Maryland teacher had a heart attack at school. His coworkers leapt into action

A Maryland high school teacher is alive thanks in part to the quick actions of his colleagues. Six teachers and two other staff members at Sherwood High School in Montgomery County jumped into action when that teacher went into cardiac arrest.

Two of them said it was their prior training that gave them the confidence to save their colleague.

“You bring the hope that everyone should have in our community for what it should look like in an emergency and how we respond to one another,” Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Thomas Taylor told them.

A school assembly had just ended when Arianna Peralta saw a fellow teacher collapse on the floor. (News4 is not naming that teacher for privacy reasons.)

“I just went into the auditorium just to double-check to make sure everything was OK, all the kids are out, and as soon as I turned, I saw the teacher collapse,” Peralta said.

She says prior training from years ago kicked in on how to respond.

“I’m sure that it had to do with I took a first responders’ class back in 2010 when I was in Montgomery College, and just remembering like what they taught us to do in a moment like that kind of just kicked in,” she said. “I don’t think I would’ve known what to do; I think maybe I would have frozen.”

A staff member called 911, and four teachers took turns doing CPR.

“When I saw Dr. [Keri] Sykora starting to perform CPR, I ran screaming for an AED, and I only knew to do that because of that first responders class,” Peralta said.

Football coach Patrick Celento then dashed out of the auditorium for the AED. He knew where they were because the athletics program just had a training about them. Celento then took over performing chest compressions on the teacher, while the school’s nurse practitioner prepared the AED.

Montgomery County EMS said those actions prevented the situation from becoming even more severe.

“Of course, it was a total team effort,” Celento said. “There’s a lot of people involved. A lot of people didn’t panic. They did what they needed to do to save the life.”

The teacher who had the heart attack is still in a hospital but is expected to make a full recovery, according to school district officials.

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