Masked and back to class: 'You can just feel the energy' as students return to the Glenbrooks
That's more like it.
The first day of school at Glenbrook North and South high schools was a buzz of activity as students returned to campus.
Masked, yes, as mandated, but they were there - unlike the 2020-21 school year, which began remotely, went hybrid in October, suffered an adaptive pause in November, and offered full in-person learning in January.
Even then, students like Glenbrook South junior Bailey Hwang opted to remain home and take her lessons remotely.
On Wednesday morning, however, she was in Jill Serling's honors physics class participating in an impromptu lab after the sprightly Serling hopped up on a lab table to demonstrate.
"I still feel like a freshman. It's so nervous coming back because I haven't been here since last year," Hwang said.
"Some people did in-person, but I haven't done it. It was just really nervous to see everyone and talk to people and have a bunch of people near me. And it's so exciting. I'm so happy to actually physically communicate with people and see them," she said.
Her freshman year ended with a whimper as students left for 2020 spring break, never to return, as the pandemic took hold mid-March.
"I feel like everyone is a lot more talkative this year," Hwang said. "In freshman year people were still very communicative, but everyone is a lot more happy and friendly because everyone's so excited to come back."
District 225 communications specialist Christina Salonikas noted that Superintendent Charles Johns said only the senior classes have experienced a school year unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Still, students and staff members will be required to take a SHIELD Illinois saliva test this week, regardless of vaccination status, to gain baseline data. Athletes and students in high-risk activities, such as band, drama and speech, will subsequently be required to test once weekly.
Glenbrook North principal Jason Markey did catch something.
He caught the feeling.
"It is an absolute joy to have the energy of our hallways and our learning spaces full of students and staff to start the year at Glenbrook North," Markey said. "We look forward to an exciting year full of our students reaching new heights in academics, the arts, athletics and activities."
First, they have to get there. Over the summer Glenbrook South underwent a comprehensive interior and exterior signage makeover. This had teachers and staff out in the hallways during passing periods directing traffic, helping students get to newly numbered classrooms. Over time it will be a more direct and simpler system, but on Wednesday it felt new even to the veterans.
"This whole school has been renumbered, so kids are finding their way and the adults are finding their way as well, so we're all navigating. But regardless of that we're persevering here, and kids are on their way to class," said Rosanne Williamson, since 2009 the district's assistant superintendent for Educational Services, now serving as Glenbrook South's interim principal for 2021-22.
"It's just really refreshing and exciting to have the kids back. You can just feel the energy, even more so, I think, than the start of a normal school year.
"The kids are really excited to be back, happy to be back - wearing their masks, regardless of that," Williamson said. "I mean, everybody's just super-excited to be here today."