Students, faculty, and staff at Cedartown High School are mourning the loss of one of their own as a 17-year-old senior student died in a car accident Tuesday morning.
According to Cedartown Police Chief Jamie Newsome, Karina Macedo was pronounced dead at Polk Medical Center shortly after the single-vehicle wreck on Collard Valley Road near Clyde Street at 7:45 a.m. Tuesday.
Cedartown High School Principal Derrell Wetherington says Karina was well loved by her classmates and teachers.
“She was a wonderful, upstanding young lady. She was an A-B student. she touched the lives of so many of her teachers and the students,” said Dr. Wetherington. “She was a diligent drama and theater student. Her drama and theater teacher, Chris Reaves, is just in utter disbelief and is stunned by the turn of events because she was such an integral part of his everyday life and that’s how she was with all her teachers and classmates…She was just a joy to be around.”
Karina was a passenger in a vehicle with two other CHS students. They were treated and released from the hospital Tuesday afternoon.
Dr. Wetherington said that special grieving counselors have been called in.
“We will continue to have the grieving and counseling rooms set up throughout the course of the week,” Dr. Wetherington said. “We’ll also be in contact with the family as soon as possible. We want to be respectful of the family in this time healing they need to go through, and we will be of any assistance to the family that we can.”
Chief Jamie Newsome asks that the community please remember the family of Karina Wtherington in their thoughts and prayers during this difficult time.