GRANITE FALLS – As instructed, Colette Dahl packed water, food, mosquito repellent and rubber boots to protect her feet from snakes.
Granite Falls School District’s only registered nurse touched down Saturday in Montgomery, Ala., where she expects to work long hours helping evacuees from Hurricane Katrina for a week.
“I just felt compelled to go,” she said earlier in the week. “This is one way to put to use the gifts that I have been given to a broader use. I just know it’s the right thing to do. For me, it’s what you train your whole life to do”
Dahl, 33, has already seen the ripples of her own good will. When she asked for time off, the district waived the request for personal leave.
The Lake Stevens School District, in turn, said it would make a registered nurse available for consultation in her absence.
A middle school office worker whose husband is on strike at Boeing wrote a check for $20 so Dahl could buy supplies for Katrina victims.
“That was all very generous,” she said.
Dahl, who also works at the sexual assault center at Providence Everett Medical Center in Everett, on Friday briefed individual teachers on what to do in case students experience serious medical problems, including some with diabetes, seizures and hemophilia.
She’ll keep her cell phone with her, just in case the school calls.
“I just want to make sure my kids – all 2,400 of them – are okay when I’m gone,” she said.
Reporter Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446 or stevick@heraldnet.com.
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