A teacher at Apalachee High School in Georgia recalled how she kept her students calm when a shooter opened fire on the property the week.

“I lied to my kids today in second period,” language teacher Jennifer Carter wrote Wednesday on Facebook. “I told them it was just a drill.”

Carter, who has taught at the school for more than two decades, said she instructed her students to get behind the couches in her classroom and stay quiet. She told them the quieter they were, the faster the drill would end.

“My kids were able to just hide and not panic for over 10 minutes, until we heard the banging on doors, walkie talkies, and yelling in the hallway,” she wrote. “Then I had to come clean.”

Carter’s 18 students were still “brave” when confronted with the truth, and did exactly as she asked.

She added, “It was the worst 20 minutes of my career.”

Carter, who was honored as the high school’s 2022-2023 teacher of the year, said she arranges her classroom’s furniture every year in anticipation of a shooter.

Carter, the students in Carter’s class and Carter’s daughter, who is also a student at the school, all survived the shooting. Four people ― two students and two teachers ― were killed, and nine were injured.

The alleged shooter, 14-year-old student Colt Gray, was arrested and charged with murder. His father, Colin Gray, has also been arrested. The father’s charges, which include second degree murder and involuntary manslaughter, stem from allegations that he knowingly allowed his son to possess the AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle used in the shooting.

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