Faculty welcomes back students

Published 12:00 am Monday, August 14, 2006

School administrators reported few problems as Butler County students kicked off the 2006-07 school year on Thursday.

&#8220It was awesome,” said Superintendent Mike Looney. &#8220A fantastic day. We had a few kids get on the wrong bus but all principals reported a smooth first day of class.”

Looney spent Thursday school-hopping. The second-year school super started his day off at Greenville High School, enjoyed lunch with students and faculty at Greenville Middle School, and wrapped things up at Greenville Elementary and W.O. Parmer.

&#8220I wanted to see how our new principal (Catherine Zawicki) at W.O. Parmer was doing and she had things in good shape,” said Looney.

Aside from some students jumping on the wrong school bus, traffic was also a problem at W.O. Parmer and Greenville Elementary. The Greenville Police Department had extra patrol officers on duty to help combat the heavy traffic volume. Looney said it's a situation that should improve over the course of the next few weeks.

&#8220The first couple of weeks all the parents want to bring the children to school,” he said. &#8220We certainly understand that, but some will be putting their children on the buses. With kindergarten, all the parents like to bring them in. Things will calm down. But were it not for the police department doing a great job we would have a bad time.”

At the high school, it took some students awhile to find their classes in the massive facility, but GHS Principal Dr. Kathy Murphy said by lunch things were &#8220swinging right along.”

&#8220Our first day is really going off without a glitch,” she said.

Greenville Middle School Principal Jai Hill said the first day of school was way better than last year, his first as principal at GMS.

&#8220Last year, the big thing was the dress code,” Hill said, referring to the school system's implementation of a countywide dress code for students in 2005. &#8220This year, we saw parents having their kids prepared and ready to start school in the right attire.”

GMS students have also taken to a new class schedule, which Hill refers to as &#8220part-block, part modified-block.” Hill said the new daily schedule is comprised of eight periods within four traditional block time frames. Science and social studies are allotted 45 minutes each, and math and reading an hour and 30 minutes apiece, along with electives.

&#8220I've had several of the kids come up to me and say how much they like the new schedule,” he said.