High school fills gap when parents are off at war....

A high school, but also family
With parents off to war, Ft. Campbell students live with fear every day, but they have bonds with each other and with their teachers

By Colleen Mastony
Tribune staff reporter
Published June 5, 2006

FT. CAMPBELL, Ky. -- On a recent day at Ft. Campbell High School, a soldier shipping out to Iraq stopped by the school to tell an administrator: "Take care of my child while I'm gone." Here, at one of the few high schools in the nation run by the Defense Department and located on a U.S. Army base, it went without saying that the soldier might never come home.

At Ft. Campbell High, students rarely talk about the war or casualties. But the sight of a military officer in a full-dress uniform in the school hallway has been known to unleash a flood of tears among younger teenagers, who fear a death notification could come at any moment, even in front of their lockers.

Such events might seem unusual to those who live "outside the gate," said Principal Elaine Gallivan, referring to the nearby base entrance that is fortified with concrete barriers and armed guards.

But this is Ft. Campbell High, where all 550 students are sons and daughters of soldiers. And over the last three years, as mothers and fathers shipped out to a war half a world away, the school became a second home for teenagers on the base, and teachers stepped in as substitute parents.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0606050183jun05,1,1785528.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

but Dear Lord, there is a lot of pain for kids to deal with..