It's a bird! It's a plane! It's teachers going for Guinness record!

If you visited Dundee-Crown High School on Tuesday, you might have thought you mistakenly landed in the middle of a comic book convention.

That's because more than 1,400 hundred students and teachers dressed up as superheroes Tuesday in an attempt to break a Guinness World Record.

By the school's count, more than 1,454 students and staff came in superhero garb, shattering the previous world record of 1,016.

Tuesday morning, the students and staff filed into the school gymnasium, representing a catalog of comic book and cartoon characters, from the Incredibles to Captain Underpants.

"It was amazing," said Lisa Holbrook, the chemistry teacher who spearheaded the attempt. "We had 1,400 people in there. It was really neat because we had a whole wall of bleachers and not one staff member sitting among the students and there were no problems at all."

Students had to mill around for 10 minutes for their world record attempt to be valid, according to Guinness rules. Once the school had counted all the superheroes, the positive result was announced.

"They all came pouring out of the bleachers, screaming and yelling, jumping up and down and lifting each other up," Holbrook said.

Holbrook worked with the school's student council, Voices group and Superfans to organize the world record attempt in an effort to promote school unity and help local charities.

Student groups collected 932 items for the Fish Food Pantry in Carpentersville and $1,851 for the Community Crisis Center in Elgin as part of the effort.

Senior Tim Riley, a member of Voices, was one of dozens of students suited up as Superman.

"Everyone was pretty pumped up and (there was) a lot of yelling," Riley said. "It sounded ridiculous, but it was fun to be able to be a part of it."

The record won't be official until Guinness World Records verifies the school's count. Holbrook said she and her students have discussed the possibility the school may have to defend its record next year.

"We'll be watching the Guinness numbers, I'll tell you that," she said.