Teachers honored at elementary school for saving student who was choking
By Toni Yates
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MANCHESTER TOWNSHIP, New Jersey (WABC) — Any student can tell you, that some of the best memories during the school day happen at the lunch table.
For one Student at Manchester’s Ridgeway Elementary School in New Jersey, he will remember it as the setting where his life was saved.
Staff members who stepped in to save the choking child will remember it too.
They got a heroes’ salute for their quick thinking at Manchester Township School District’s most recent board meeting.
Lunch aide Alyssa Testa and Physical Education teacher Reid Stapp are bonafide lifesavers.
On February 19, both were monitoring lunchtime in the cafeteria at Ridgeway Elementary School when Testa got a frantic tap on her shoulder from a child who was choking.
“When I turned around the student was bright red and had their hand on their throat indicating that they were choking,” Testa said.
She called for backup.
“I heard my name and I looked over and she was like he’s choking,” Stapp said.
Stapp has been teaching at Ridgeway for 3 years now. His daughter is a student there and she was having lunch at the time.
She saw her dad and Testa save a life.
“When I helped him using the Heimlich a couple thrusts to help it dislodge from his throat,” Stapp said.
Assistant principal Dana DiLorenzo heard the alert and ran to the cafeteria to find the child.
“Flanked by many adults and was safe and breathing and that’s when I could breathe myself,” DiLorenzo said.
Testa and Stapp say they are especially proud of all the students who were there and stayed calm to let them save their classmate’s life.
“The students remained silent they sat in their seats, they didn’t cause any other raucous in the lunchroom and just kind of let us do what we needed to do, I couldn’t be more proud,” Testa said.
Their classmate is doing just fine.
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