By Simone Sebastian, Michael Ventura and Carla Zanoni
DNAinfo Staff
HARLEM — The last day of the academic year at Harlem's Columbia Secondary School should have been cause for celebration, but instead, devastated students and parents gathered to mourn the loss of Nicole Suriel, 12, who drowned Tuesday during a class trip to Long Beach.
The group of more than 150 assembled in Morningside Park Friday evening and lit candles, sang songs and embraced as they remembered a sixth grader known for her "endless modesty, grace and kindness to others."
“Everyone was here to mourn a terrific, vibrant and lovely child," said Susan Lehman, an Upper East Side resident whose daughter went to school with Suriel. "The kids are in mourning. Something terrible happened, but they are a strong community, they are banding together."
Earlier Friday, Suriel's father Juan and other family members and friends attended a wake at a Washington Heights funeral home.
Throughout the day, students lit candles at a makeshift memorial for Suriel outside her Harlem school, where newspaper clippings about her death had been replaced by pictures from happier times.
One showed her sitting on a rock. Another was of her reading something on a piece of paper. And in a third she was smiling at the camera, sitting in a kayak on the water, wearing a life preserver.
Some students wore pictures of Suriel hanging by ribbons or chains from their necks.
Grief counselors were to be at the school throughout the day, according to a posting on the school's website.
"The kids need some space," said a counselor dressed all in black, who declined to give her name. "The staff, too."
