Brand new schools, principals and a more restrictive cell phone
policy
Gilroy – Soak it in – the last 48 hours of summer will end with a bus ride for area students Monday morning.
When the 9,700 students return to Gilroy Unified School District campuses, many will enter the classrooms of the 55 new teachers in the district and greeted by the three new principals. Some will enter new schools completely.
“We’re as ready as we’re going to be,” said Antonio Del Buono Principal Tammy Gabel, who hosted parents and students for an afternoon tea at the school Friday.
For Del Buono students, the tea is a tradition – when they and their parents meet with teachers and learn their way around the school.
“It makes things more manageable the first day of school,” Gabel explained.
It also serves as a symbol that the school year is here.
The start of the new school year often means new clothes, new supplies, new teachers and new classmates. And for students attending Gilroy High School and Mount Madonna Continuation High School, it means new leadership – as James Maxwell and Sergio Montenegro take over as principals of the respective schools. South Valley Middle School students will be welcomed by new Principal John Perales, who joins the staff from Mt. Madonna.
Teachers, along with the new principals, are preparing for incoming students.
“I’m just looking forward to meeting all the new students,” said Antonio Del Buono kindergarten teacher Andrea Federspiel as she sat at a tiny table, laminating name tags.
Changes across the district abound.
This year, middle school students have an extra half-hour to sleep in, finish homework or just plain lounge in their pajamas.
Buses will be become a thing of the past for students attending Eliot Elementary and El Roble Elementary. With the district’s move to neighborhood schools, students live close enough to campus to walk.
But parents driving their children to either Rod Kelley, Luigi Aprea or Del Buono schools, should prepare for a delay.
On Monday and Tuesday, the section of Santa Teresa Boulevard, from Longmeadow Drive to Hirasaki Cour, will be closed for street paving.
On Wednesday and Thursday, another portion of Santa Teresa, from Welburn Avenue and Gaunt Drive, will be closed.
“I’m sure it’s going to have an impact. The traffic really changes once school starts,” GUSD Superintendent Edwin Diaz said. “But it appears that they’re not going to be paving until after 8:30am.”
City Engineer Charlie Kruegersuggests parents give themselves an additional five minutes in the morning.
Students pulling into the high school will walk past the new football field and track on their way through the gates. They also have a new library to enjoy.
Throughout the district, classrooms will be a lot quieter too.
In the spring, the GUSD board passed a cell phone policy preventing elementary students from carrying them, middle schoolers from using them during school hours and high school students from using them in class. Phones are not to be left in vibrate mode – but turned off completely. Other personal signaling devices such as beepers are included under the policy.
However, students with medical conditions may carry phones, or students with situations approved by the principal on a case-by-case basis.
“Everything looks pretty good. Everyone’s putting the final touches on their classrooms,” Diaz said.
