Excitement, unease as Norwalk students return to school
As principal of Rowayton Elementary School she looks forward to the first day of classes each year.
“Seeing students’ smiling faces as they walk through the door is the reason we all chose this profession,” Reilly said.
Wednesday morning, she wasn’t let down.
A large crowd of excited students and parents gathered early on the grass lawn and concrete sidewalk in front of the building at Rowayton Elementary School.
Students waited anxiously for the 9:05 a.m. bell to ring, allowing them to enter and start the new school year.
“The kids were so eager to come in that we had to make single-file lines,” Reilly said.
Lisa Ennico was one of the parents who showed up Wednesday morning. She waited outside with her sons Emmet and Oliver.
Ennico said Reilly wasn’t alone in her lack of sleep Tuesday night. The prospect of starting another school year kept her boys up late Tuesday night, too.
For Oliver Ennico, a first-grader, there was an added layer of uncertainty: It would be his first day at Rowayton Elementary School, where he would join big brother Emmet, a fourth-grader.
“He was a little nervous,” Lisa Ennico said. “But the boys are excited to be together in the same school.”
The setting was similar at several of the 19 public schools across Norwalk, which opened their doors to students Wednesday to kick off the new school year.
Traffic backed up around many of the campuses as students filed out of cars and bright yellow buses, donning fresh garb and backpacks full of new school supplies to help them take on the year of learning.
A short drive down the road from Rowayton, at Brookside Elementary School, parents quickly filled the parking lot while dropping off their kids for the day, forcing others to pull vehicles onto the grass lawn and onto the sides of nearby streets.
Mirlande Pressat made it to the entrance and stood outside Brookside with her daughter Kate Lynn early Wednesday morning. She took photographs of Kate Lynn on her first day of first grade.
“She has a little bit of butterflies, but she is excited and will be OK,” Pressat said.
Kate Lynn said she was excited to start school and soon rushed off through the door, with mom, to get started.
Cristina Velasquez dropped off her sons Adrian, a fifth-grader, and Andres, a third-grader, at the school Wednesday morning. Her kids seemed a little more reluctant than others.
“They were not so excited to go to school this morning,” Velasquez said. “They were crying.”
Despite some typical first-day chaos, Michael Barbis, a member of the Norwalk Board of Education, said everything was running relatively smooth across the district.
“We’ve gotten off to a really great start so far,” Barbis said. “Without a hitch… almost.”
Barbis said the school district did hit at least one snag on the first day: The new electronic lunch program was down for the day and would likely be out for the remainder of the first week.
The new program was supposed to allow parents to go online to load money into their child’s account to pay for lunch each day, but wasn’t ready for the first day back, Barbis said.
Students will still receive meals, Barbis ensured, and will simply have meal costs placed on their account to be paid for once the system is up.
Some parents took to social media to express their concerns about the lunch service, while others just seemed glad for their kids to get back to learning.
Alli Rausch was happy to walk her son Caleb, a second-grader, into Brookside, which she called a “fabulous school.”
“It was a good summer,” Rausch said after dropping off her son. “But I think we are all looking forward to school starting up again.”
Courtesy: The Norwalk Hour: By Kevin Schultz – Published 4:48 pm, Wednesday, August 31, 2016