10-Year-Old Crossing Guard Evan Siegel Saves Child's Life | Gimundo

10-Year-Old Crossing Guard Evan Siegel Saves Child’s Life

Evan Siegel, a fifth grader from Vancouver, Washington, saved a young girl's life while patrolling the streets outside his school.

By Kathryn Hawkins. Posted on April 18 2011

Salmon Creek Elementary School in Vancouver, Wash. is taking steps to teach its students about road safety through its safety patrol program. But in December, one of the school’s students taught the community a lesson about heroism instead.

Evan Siegel, a fifth-grader, works with a group of students and a teacher supervisor as a volunteer safety patrol officer. “What I do is, I keep the kids safe,” he told Washington’s KPTV. “It’s very dangerous. There’s cars coming from here, cars coming from here and here.”

The younger children are supposed to wait for the patrol officers to lead them across the street when the road is clear. But when a young girl began crossing the intersection without waiting for their signal, Evan immediately saw she was in danger: A car was speeding towards the intersection, with no intention of slowing down. “The guy was texting,” said Evan. “The windows weren’t tinted so I could see everything.”

Evan raced into the street to pull the girl back to safety. He got there in the knick of time: Luckily, both of them were unharmed. Evan’s advisor, Carol Stein, saw the boy spring into action, and credits him for saving the younger child’s life.

“When I saw it, I was in a position that I couldn’t reach it in time, and thank goodness he was, and he acted exactly like I would have hoped,” she said.

Evan is being honored with the AAA’s Lifesaving Award in Washington, D.C., and will have the opportunity to stand on the field at an upcoming Seattle Mariners game. Most of all, he understands the importance of the job he’s doing to an even greater extent than he did before.

“A lot of kids think it’s just fun and games, but it’s really not when it comes to safety for these little kids,” he said.

Filed under: Heroes,

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