NEW PALESTINE — Decked out in a red and white face mask, New Palestine High School Principal Jim Voelz also had a large picture of himself draped around his neck, like a necklace, with the photo laying across his chest.
The idea was to make sure students knew who their new principal was during the first day of school on Monday, Aug. 3. — something that was a little tricky to do with a mandatory mask protocol in place.
“We’re a little apprehensive about the first day of school, but so far so good,” Voelz said behind his mask, hours before officials learned that a student who had arrived for school had tested positive for the coronavirus.
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About 5,000 students in Southern Hancock and Eastern Hancock schools headed back to class on Monday — the vast majority of them electing to attend in person. Donning masks and armed with their districts’ new social distancing rules, they entered buildings set up to minimize contact and maximize confidence that officials will be able to confront infections inside their walls.
Greenfield-Central schools opened on Thursday, July 30. Mt. Vernon has delayed its first day of school to Aug. 17. Like G-C, Southern Hancock found itself dealing with an infection on the very first day of school. (See story at the top of Page A1.)
In a year of not knowing what to expect because of the pandemic, Voelz had an added complication on the first day of school: The former principal at New Palestine Junior High School is taking over for Principal Keith Fessler, who is on medical leave to start the school year.
Still, for Voelz, students, teachers and the community, it was time to get back to classes following the four-month shutdown due to COVID-19.
“Students have their masks on, and we’re ready to go,” Voelz said. “The staff here has been great, and most of the kids know me, but I do have my picture here for the new ones who don’t.”
With a walkie-talkie in her hand, Amy Dawson, the assistant principal at the high school, waited patiently to get the word to allow students on a bus to exit and head into the building. She thinks the district is ready to tackle any challenges this year.
“Every year, there is something different, and everybody in the whole world is dealing with this, tackling something new this year,” Dawson said.
Wes Anderson, community relations director for the district, watched the first day of school unfold from the New Palestine Elementary School parking lot as the district’s 24 buses pulled in full of students. Anderson noted administrators planned long and hard to get students back into classes.
The vast majority — 89% — elected to return to school in person. The rest opted for the district’s online studies.
“We believe in our reopening plan that has basically been in the works since we closed way back on March 11,” Anderson said.
Anderson said the sense is that the vast majority of children and teachers were ready to get back to school despite the unsettling news that a football player had tested positive for the virus on Friday, July 31.
“Our teachers miss their kids,” Anderson said. “This is a people business, and our teachers did not like losing that person-to-person connection.”
If parents and students were nervous, they didn’t show any signs. Almost every student in sight was wearing a mask as they made their way to the school entrance with their backpacks in tow.
County school districts have implemented numerous safety procedures at the recommendation of the state and county health departments. They spent weeks devising protocols for everything from hand-washing to contact tracing in the event of an infection inside the school.
That includes mapping out exactly where each student will sit in the classroom and even on the buses, said Southern Hancock transportation director Bob Martin, who personally directed bus traffic on the first day of school.
Martin’s department is making sure every student on the buses has a mask and that drivers are disinfecting all the buses after each morning and and afternoon route.
“We want to support the district and the county health department in combating this thing as best we can,” Martin said.
At New Palestine Elementary School, newly appointed Principal Kayleigh Fosnow and the assistant principal, Nick Giant, greeted elementary students enthusiastically despite not being able to show off a smile behind their masks.
They both agreed elementary school educators have a tough task in trying to help the younger students understand the importance of keeping the masks on during the day.
“We have set up our classrooms to be safe, and we will have mask breaks when the kids go outside where they can get some fresh air,” Fosnow said.
Giant noted that once the teachers set the expectations, the students will adhere to them.
“They’ll adjust to the new normal,” Giant said. “We’ve planned for a lot of new things, and we’re excited to just see what the kids are going to do.”
Fosnow said the plans look great on paper, but the best way to see how things unfold is to take it a day at a time. She noted the biggest step was getting the kids back into the building.
At Eastern Hancock, as in other districts, visitors were not allowed to enter the school buildings on the first day of school. That meant no parents walking their young children to class. Eastern Hancock Elementary School Principal Amanda Pyle said that was her biggest concern about the first day back, but everything went well: Parents were accepting of the rule, and the morning passed with only one kindergarten student in a brief bout of tears.
Pyle said the majority of her students have been so happy to be back at school, seeing their classmates and teachers again, that having to wear masks has not registered as a concern.
“The kids are being rock stars. They’re doing everything that we ask them to,” she said.
News of positive COVID-19 tests at other schools did not change Pyle’s perspective on reopening. While it’s probably inevitable, she said, that some members of the school community will test positive, EH can remind parents of the importance of self-screening for symptoms and keeping kids home if they are sick or waiting for the results of a test.
“All we can do is educate parents and help them keep their kids safe,” she said.
Less than 5 percent of students at the elementary school will be using the corporation’s virtual learning option, Pyle said. Adam Barton, principal of Eastern Hancock Middle and High Schools, said about 4 percent of his students are learning from home.
Barton said he is proud of the planning that went into the corporation’s reopening plan and of his students’ observation of social distancing and face covering on the first day.
“Things are off to a great start,” he said.
