Grace Lavigne drove herself from her home in Woodbury to Hill-Murray School in nearby Maplewood the first day of the school year. As vice president of the student council, the 16-year-old arrived early to decorate and join other council members greeting students in grades 6-12 at the school’s two main entrances.

The Aug. 19 opening is the earliest, in-person Catholic school opening in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, making it a forerunner in bringing students back to campus during the COVID-19 pandemic. As students arrived, they heard music playing and saw a big “Welcome Back” sign, school flags waving and two students dressed as mascots “Ma and Pa Pioneer.” Seniors enjoyed a “sunrise breakfast” followed by a prayer service before school.

Freshman Maggie St. Sauver, 14, also from Woodbury, and new to Hill-Murray, was understandably nervous as her mom drove her to school the first day.

“I told her it was perfectly normal because you’re a freshman, you’re switching schools and you’re coming back during a global pandemic,” said her mother, Wendi, a graphic designer who works at the school. “But she was also pretty excited to be in a bigger school and where her mom works.”

When Maggie stopped by her mom’s office to pick up her lunch, she had two new friends in tow. “She loved it,” Wendi said. “It was a great day. I asked her how she would rate her first day on a scale of 1 to 10, and she said ‘a high 8.’”

Wendi was impressed that every student she saw throughout the day wore a mask and kept it on. School staff wear masks or face shields.

Signs in the school remind students of new safety precautions and hand sanitizer is readily available. Desks are spaced apart, and teachers’ desks have Plexiglas guards. In the cafeteria — used by some students who arrive early — chairs were marked with stickers, indicating which could be used and which were “spacers.”

Bobby Lawrence, newly 18, is among seniors starting their senior year. “It was great being back and just being in the classroom, even with restrictions, masks and stuff,” he said. “But it felt really good.”

Lawrence said he hadn’t seen about half of the friends he used to see at school since mid-March, when schools across Minnesota suspended in-person classes and moved to distance-learning due to the novel coronavirus. No hugs are allowed, but there were a few elbow bumps.

Lavigne, the student council vice president, shared Lawrence’s enthusiasm at being around classmates again.

“I think people are just really happy to be able to have that social aspect again because we lacked that for six months,” she said. “And I think it’s definitely taken a toll on everybody.”

The senior class met first thing with Erin Herman, high school principal and director, to go over expectations for the year.

“It was a pretty special feeling knowing that they were doing everything they could to get us back in school, and a lot of other schools couldn’t do that,” Lawrence said. Some schools in Minnesota are continuing with distance learning as their only option this fall. Most Catholic schools in the archdiocese are beginning the year with in-classroom learning.

At Hill-Murray, students were reminded throughout the day to avoid touching or hugging, and to keep a safe distance from one another to help prevent the virus’ spread, Lawrence said.

“You just have to move past that and … enjoy the good things about school,” he said. “It sounds kind of weird but … finally learning with your teacher right in front of you was really refreshing. You’re not staring at a screen six hours a day. They’re asking how you’re doing.”

Kelly Schwartzbauer, who teaches seventh- and ninth-grade English, said that with students returning, the school was full of life and energy again. On the first day, “I just lit up, knowing I’d have kids in my room again,” she said.

Many things felt familiar, she said, like hearing of a student who forgot a locker combination. But some things are quite new, such as box lunches delivered to her classroom for students who ordered them, because the cafeteria isn’t being used to serve food.

Even while facing a classroom of masked students carefully spaced apart — and teaching under a face shield — the first day felt incredibly normal and, overall, very joyful, Schwartzbauer said.

More than 800 hours of staff time were spent developing a health and safety plan for the school, said Hill-Murray President Jim Hansen.

He said the team first identified the school’s value systems, with decisions made based on those values.

“We placed the educational commitment we have to parents, to provide a rigorous academic experience, equal to the commitment we have for safety. Trying to keep academics of equal importance with safety was … a constant struggle for us,” he said.

During its 2020 summer program, 790 students participated in classes, arts and learning activities and athletics, Hansen said. Precautions and actions mirrored what would happen when the school year began. The school hired an additional nurse during the summer program, whose duties included taking random temperature checks.

Two students tested positive for coronavirus during the summer session, Hansen said. Neither had significant symptoms. One attended baseball camp, so the camp was closed for three days. The other was in the football program and that student was quarantined. “So we didn’t need to shut down school,” he said.

Today, each classroom is disinfected after every class, Hansen said. The school’s cleaning staff also cleans at night.

“Just hearing the kids in the hallway is so uplifting for all of us who work here,” Wendi St. Sauver said. “The teachers are excited to have the kids back. The halls are full of energy because you can feel the kids are so happy to be back.”

EARLY START

In June, school leaders decided to start the 2020-2021 school year nearly two weeks earlier than planned and extend it into June. That was based on a pandemic-related model used in Germany last spring.

Rather than closing schools, German students were asked to stay home during a two-week quarantine period. Students were then brought back to classrooms for three weeks followed by another quarantine period, and then brought back, so they were able to complete the school year. “We thought that made a lot of sense, so we are using a similar type of schedule this year,” said James Hansen, president of Hill-Murray School.

So Hill-Murray moved up the beginning of its school year, starting Aug. 19 and 20. The school is in session for a couple weeks, followed by a school break built into the schedule, then three weeks of classes and another break period, then three weeks followed by Thanksgiving break, and three weeks and then a two-week break at Christmas.

“We’ve built some natural quarantine periods into our calendar,” Hansen said. “So we will be prepared and, if we need to, could do distance learning around one of those weeks, which gives us 14 days naturally built into our calendar. That way, parents could make vacation plans and manage it.”

Hansen said that if an outbreak occurs, this schedule would give school leaders a way to manage it. “We could just send everybody home for a week, plus a week of vacation already built in.”

Hansen said “contact hours” — classroom time — with students remain the same as a normal school year. “So we’re back to the values statement,” he said, referring to the values that guided Hill-Murray’s school plan. “We were equally concerned about not just safety, but with their academic experience. So by starting earlier, we could keep the number of contact minutes with kids the same, but still provide all these extra breaks throughout the year.”