A 56-year-old football official went into cardiac arrest on the sideline at Jefferson High School in Lafayette in 2006. Then, a teenager who was playing basketball during lunch at the school's Tecumseh Junior High gym went into cardiac arrest a decade later.
Chances of surviving a sudden cardiac arrest are significantly higher if a school is prepared with a response plan and devices known as AEDs. But data show many schools aren't as prepared as they could be.