New Canaan Students 'Excited To Be Back' For First Day Of School

NEW CANAAN, CT — School buildings in town were "very vibrant and alive" as New Canaan Public Schools students returned for their first day of classes Monday.

Superintendent Bryan Luizzi said students, teachers and staff were all happy to kick off the 2021-2022 school year and everyone appeared excited.

"It was a wonderful day," Luizzi said. "Our kids were excited to be back, our teachers were thrilled to have them and our parents were happy. I think we really got off to a great start today."

Luizzi attributed some of that excitement to a few operational changes that led to a somewhat looser, but still safe, feeling compared to last year due to the ongoing coronavirus crisis.

"We've removed the plexiglass from the classrooms and kids are traveling in the hallways a bit more than they were last year," Luizzi said. "I think that teachers and kids are excited to get back to a little more normalcy."

The superintendent also noted it felt good to get to this point after a lot of time was spent over the summer preparing for a successful return to school Monday.

"It's a mixture of exhaustion and relief," Luizzi said, "but really it's what we do. We put in incredible amounts of work and just countless hours and effort and work together here as a team to prepare for this day, and we want it to be the best day it could possible be for everyone, because we really feel the work we do in our schools is the most important work on the planet and we want to make sure that every child and every teacher understands that, feels that and really feels proud [to be] a part of our school community."

Board of Education Chair Katrina Parkhill agreed Monday was a great start to the school year and said it was wonderful to see photos of happy, energized students excited to be back together as they returned to school buildings.

"Everyone in our district has worked very hard over the summer to prepare our buildings and classrooms to welcome our students back [Monday]," Parkhill said in an email. "We express our gratitude to all of our administrators, teachers and staff, and we wish all of our students a wonderful school year."

According to Luizzi, pick up and drop off times at all schools in the district ran smoothly Monday, though he acknowledged there was a little more traffic than anticipated, which is typical.

Police Lt. Jason Ferraro said the first day of school ran smoothly from a police standpoint and there were no complaints of traffic issues in school zones Monday.

Kindergarten orientations in New Canaan were held outside with small groups of parents and kids ahead of their first day Tuesday. Luizzi said the district will look to do more outside this year when possible.

"We already saw teachers taking classes outside for snack or doing tours around the building, going outside...first graders hadn't been in the hallways much," Luizzi said. "They spent most of their time just in their classrooms last year, so they're becoming familiar with the building and using the outdoors for lunches and for class wherever possible, for snacks. Our buildings are very vibrant and alive right now."

Luizzi said the district did not encounter any issues regarding masks or social distancing at any of New Canaan's schools Monday.

"I think our students, they understand what the expectations are and it's the way we ended last year," Luizzi said, "so as they come in with their masks on, they understand the social distancing. We've got markings throughout the buildings as visual cues to remind our students of the distance that we need to keep, and they're pretty well versed in the mitigation strategies at this point, so they kind of came right in and got themselves into their classrooms and got started right away."

Luizzi visited all five schools in town Monday and spoke to a number of classes, during which he told students the first day of school is the best day ever, however the second day of school is even better, and the third is even better than that.

"I think that's the positive spirit that we bring in," Luizzi said, "helping every one of our kids to really make the most of their time in school, so we're really looking forward to a great year with everybody and making this the best year yet."