How the staff at Oyster Bay's Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School saved a 5-year-old's life

Matthew Bansi was in the nurse’s office at Theodore Roosevelt Elementary School in Oyster Bay on the morning of Dec. 5 when he received a call: A student was unresponsive in a kindergarten classroom.

“I was just thinking, what am I going to walk into? I need to run because a child’s on the floor,” Bansi said in an interview. “Every second matters.”

He sprinted to the room to find Sebastian Melendez, 5, lying on the carpet near his teacher, Megan Castrogiovanni, who had started giving CPR. Bansi found a faint pulse on Melendez, who was losing color, and began giving chest compressions as co-teacher Eileen Pape called 911.

What began as a typical school day quickly turned into a harrowing scene that prompted a schoolwide response — from teachers and aides to the superintendent and school nurse — to help save the boy. 

Michelle Morris, a kindergarten aide, quickly grabbed an automated external defibrillator, or AED, which analyzed Sebastian's heart rhythm and instructed staff to continue chest compressions. Tara Cornelious, a security guard at the school for nearly two decades and a former NYPD detective, raised Sebastian's legs to improve blood flow.

After almost two minutes of CPR, “Sebastian’s eyes opened a little bit,” Bansi said.

Seconds later, paramedics were in the classroom and brought Sebastian to Glen Cove Hospital.

“It was very emotional,” Cornelious recalled. “It’s very hard to see a child in a medical emergency.”

A rapid response

Castrogiovanni and Pape were holding a lesson on the classroom carpet when Sebastian didn’t respond to a question. He began to lean back.

“That’s when we realized something was up,” Castrogiovanni said.

Both teachers are also coaches in the district and leaned into their CPR training.

Morris, an aide and also a coach, quickly shuffled the other students out of the room while Principal Devra Small coordinated a building-wide response to help clear a path for emergency responders, who arrived within minutes.

Castrogiovanni and Dr. Francesco Ianni — the superintendent of the Oyster Bay-East Norwich school district, who rushed to the scene — rode in the ambulance with Melendez and went with him into the emergency department.

'We both felt so helpless'

Kerrin Melendez, Sebastian’s mom, is a guidance counselor at Herricks Middle School in Albertson and missed a call while she was in a staff meeting.

Then, a secretary came in and gave her the phone. It was her husband. Their son wasn’t breathing, he told her.

“I just started screaming,” Kerrin Melendez said in an interview. “It was a parent’s nightmare to get a phone call like that.”

Glen Cove Hospital was about 45 minutes away, so school staff began driving her to meet up with her husband, who was at work, and find Sebastian.

“We both felt so helpless,” she said.

When she arrived at the hospital, she found Sebastian extremely lethargic and slurring his words. Hospital workers ran tests on him before Sebastian was transferred to Cohen Children's Medical Center in Queens, where he underwent extensive scans and blood work.

It’s still unclear what prompted the medical episode, Kerrin Melendez said, and recent weeks have involved back-and-forth trips to doctors' offices. But just days after the incident, she said, Sebastian returned to class — to a room of supportive staff and children.

“He doesn’t remember anything from that day, which is a blessing,” Melendez said. “But he was so excited when he finally went back to school … He felt like the most important boy.”

“It was like a party, mommy,” he told her.

'They are our family'

The school staff was recognized Dec. 16 with citations at the Oyster Bay-East Norwich Board of Education meeting.

In an interview days after the incident, Castrogiovanni reflected on that morning. 

“They are our family, and we take that job really seriously to make sure that they’re safe and they’re healthy,” Castrogiovanni said. “There was no doubt that we were going to do anything to make sure he was going to be OK at the end of the day.”

Cornelious said the school staff “worked so well and so seamlessly” to both provide lifesaving care to Sebastian and shield other students from the response. “Seeing it all work … It was just a really great moment.”

Ianni, the district superintendent, said the staff's response shows that students "are surrounded by people who will move mountains to protect them."

“From leading classmates to safety, to performing CPR, to holding Sebastian’s hand in the ambulance, these actions speak volumes about the genuine dedication our staff has for keeping all students safe,” Ianni said in a statement. “I am incredibly proud of each one of them and deeply grateful that their quick actions helped save Sebastian.”