I was in 5th grade at College Park Elementary in Deer Park TX (Houston 'burb) & we were watching the launch in class... was just horrible to see, most of the class burst into tears & the teacher was scambling to turn off the TV while trying not to lose it herself.
Now I work in a quality assurance / control lab at the Johnson Space Center. I do mechanical and chemical testing of fasteners & parts used for mockup and flight training (NBL, SSTF, etc..) and flight qualification for use on the Shuttle and ISS. We also test stuff for the NASA aircraft (T-38, etc..) out at Ellington and development items for the soon to be re-organized Constellation program, the CEV / Orion group, EVA, Engineering, etc, etc, etc... I also support failure analysis & counterfit part investigations from time to time and conduct soldering workmanship skills & inspection cert / re-cert classes about once per quarter.