Pahoa-area students impacted by the ongoing lava flow reported for the first time Monday morning to their temporary classrooms at the Keonepoko North campus.
A slow-moving line of cars and school buses filed through a one-way entrance on the campus, dropping off students at the same spot as high school students reporting to Keaau High. Some of the older students helped to get the keiki situated in their new surroundings, while some were escorted by their parents who came to have a look at the improvised temporary campus, according to Department of Education spokeswoman Donalyn Dela Cruz.
“Overall, I think everyone was patient. … There was such a community aspect to this, from the student level,” she said. “Some of the teens were helping some of the younger students, making sure they knew where they were supposed to be.”
The new facility, which consists of 11 portable classrooms split into 22 rooms and sits on a parking lot of Keaau High School’s campus, was expected to welcome about 300 students from Keonepoko Elementary and 150 from Pahoa Elementary. The students are those who live north of the area where the lava is expected to cross Highway 130, which would effectively cut them off from or seriously impede their access to Keonepoko and Pahoa.
On Friday, similarly impacted students from Pahoa High & Intermediate, Keonepoko Elementary, and Pahoa Elementary reported to their new campuses at Keaau High and Keaau Middle. Meanwhile, the students who continue to attend Keaau High and Middle, Pahoa High & Intermediate, and Pahoa Elementary also returned to class after the campuses were closed Oct. 30 to allow staff to prepare for the transitions.
The transition and the first day went surprisingly smoothly considering the scope of the changes for both students and staff, according to Principal Brandon Gallagher.
“From the dropoff first thing in the morning, to the pickup just now, to beginning the afterschool programs, we’ve seen very, very minimal issues,” he said.
Two students got onto the wrong buses in the morning, but other than that, parents seemed to have been well notified about the changes and how it would affect their kids.
“I was pleasantly surprised, because I was a little nervous about how it would go today,” Gallagher said.
A total of 20 of the rooms are used for instruction, and they experienced few problems today, he said, with a few requiring hookups of electric sockets and other minor last-minute adjustments.
Perhaps the biggest hardship was experienced by administrators when they held a meeting with state and complex area personnel and were forced to sit on small elementary school furniture set up in a makeshift courtyard at the center of the campus.
“That was our only major hiccup for the day,” Gallagher said with a laugh.
Email Colin M. Stewart at cstewart@hawaiitribune-herald.com.