"Almost every time I was at chemo, I would listen to that song just to kind of get me through," said Jill Bass, who teaches third grade.
A beloved Florida teacher was serenaded by a sea of students dressed in pink as she returned to the school after beating breast cancer.
When Jill Bass, a third grade teacher at the Rowlett Academy in Bradenton returned to school Monday after spending weeks of treatment for breast cancer, she was shocked by the surprise students had organized.
"There's this pink archway of pink balloons to walk through, and I could see just this sea of pink behind the balloons," Bass told InsideEdition.com. "I was overwhelmed with tears in my eyes and I just couldn't believe it."
She emerged to see students, faculty members, parents, family and friends waving pink pom poms, welcoming her back.
Then, they began singing "Fight Song," by Rachel Platten.
"Almost every time I was at chemo, I would listen to that song just to kind of get me through," she said. "I like the song anyway, and it has such a personal meaning now, even more so than it ever did before."
Bass told InsideEdition.com she started noticing changes to her right breast early last year, but ignored it.
"I was only 34 with no family history, just unfortunately didn't listen to my own body," she said. "It ended up being way more advanced than it could have been had I gone four months prior."
Knowing she would miss the end of the previous school year and the beginning of the current school year for various treatments, Bass penned a letter to the parents of her students explaining the diagnosis.
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Immediately, she received overwhelming support from parents, who made up some of the crowd welcoming her back to the school.
Bass said that although she continues to get chemo treatments once a week to ward off the disease, she is hoping to be done by 2017 so she can have a fresh start to the new year.
