"It was a pretty weird day," said Cole Allex of his first day of TAKS testing at Coakley Middle School in Harlingen, but he was well prepared for the test.
"I ate breakfast and my mom drove me to school. When we got to school we had another breakfast. We came back in and that's when we started the TAKS," recalled Cole.
What he wasn't prepared for was a SWAT team surrounding a home a few blocks away from the school, causing administrators to lock down the campus.
"The announcements came on that there would be a lock down, so my teacher came over to the door and locked the door."
In the middle of the state mandated test, students had to stop what they were doing and spend the next few hours sitting in their locked classrooms wondering what was happening outside.
"I didn't hear sirens, but we did hear a helicopter, so we knew something was wrong."
Cole and his 7th grade classmates had no communication with the outside world since cell phones are restricted on campus during TAKS testing so he, like the rest of the students on campus, had no other choice than to wait it out.
"Everybody was freaking out, but nobody was crying. Some people were hyperventilating cause they were freaking out so much.”
Once the lockdown was lifted, students prepared to leave for the day and only found out what had been going on when they were picked up by their parents and saw for themselves why school officials took such swift action to protect them.
"There was an armored truck for SWAT out in the parking lot so I was like wow this must be a pretty big lockdown for a SWAT team to be here. I am very happy that they protected us and stuff."
Cole says he finished his TAKS test before lunch, but we're told students who were not done before the lockdown was ordered were asked to turn in their tests and continue them tomorrow.
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