Story highlights
NEW: Police have told Terrilynn Monette's mother they found the car and a body, she says
A police diver has found a car with a body inside believed to be Monette, police say
Monette, 26, was last seen March 2 leaving a New Orleans bar
She was celebrating with friends a "Teacher of the Year" nomination
A car with a body inside believed to be that of missing teacher Terrilynn Monette was found Saturday in a bayou in New Orleans, authorities said.
The car and body were found in Bayou St. John by a diver with the Slidell Police Department, who volunteered to dive the waterways in the search for Monette, Detective Daniel Seuzeneau of the Slidell Police Department, said.
The body is believed to be that of Monette, he said in an e-mail statement to CNN.
Monette, 26, was last seen March 2 leaving Parlay’s Dream Lounge in New Orleans, where she had been celebrating with friends her nomination for a “Teacher of the Year” award.
Monette’s mother, Toni Enclade, told CNN that investigators have notified her the car has been found, but not whether the body is her daughter.
“To know that she could have possibly been there for three months,” she said, overcome with emotion.
Enclade said she does not know when she will be given a definitive answer by authorities.
“I can’t even begin to go there right now,” she said. “I’m in shock. I can’t believe this. I just can’t believe this.”
Authorities have focused a large part of their search efforts on the waterways because Monette would have had to have driven across the bayou to get from the bar to her home.
Devoted teacher vanishes without a trace
In mid-March, an independent search and rescue team from Texas volunteer to comb the lagoons and waterways.
It discovered a car in the bayou, but it was later confirmed not to belong to Monette.
Family and friends of Monette put up a billboard in New Orleans and created a Facebook page, “We Love You Terrilynn Monette,” to help generate tips in the search for Monette.
The diver who found the car and body, Slidell Police Officer Mark Michaud, has been “working closely with the Monette family” because of his expertise in diving recoveries, Seuzeneau said.
When Monette, of Long Beach, California, learned of the “teachNOLA” program, which sends educators to New Orleans to teach in impoverished areas, she packed her bags and headed to Louisiana.
“I always wanted to be a teacher, and what better place to teach than New Orleans, where passionate teachers are needed most?” she said in a 2011 video obtained by CNN affiliate WDSU.
In her first year of teaching second grade at Woodland West Elementary School, Monette turned one of the lowest-performing classes into one of the highest achieving.
It earned her a “Teacher of the Year” nomination in her school district.
CNN’s Scott Thompson and Don Lemon contributed to this report.