FeedsNew school, new year
Workman students, staff begin classes
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Crossing guard Diane Galanty stops traffic while some of the first students head to Workman on Denton Road.Diane Galanty smiled. It was just before 8:30 a.m. on a picture-perfect Tuesday morning, and she was already busier than she had expected to be.
Galanty is a crossing guard for the Plymouth-Canton Community School District, and on this day she was helping the first students at the new Workman Elementary School across Cherry Hill Road.
“We didn’t know how many we were going to get,” she said of the pedestrian traffic. “We’ve had so many. It’s been great.”
In 15 minutes she guessed she had seen about 40 students and parents on their way.
“You can stand here,” she said to one child as he climbed off his bike and prepared to walk it across. “I’m going to walk out and I’ll tell you when you can go.”
It was a common scene across the district, which began the school year with a half-day of classes Tuesday. Workman, located at Denton and Cherry Hill roads, was built to accommodate families moving into the western part of Canton Township.
Once they crossed, the students walked through a “town square” plaza in front of the school. Work on the building is completed, though it’s clear the grounds are still a work in progress. Straw covers the newly planted grass; temporary fences section off the playground equipment.
Most of the students didn’t seem concerned with that, though. They shouted greetings to each other, looked around anxiously or asked a teacher where they should go.
In the relative quiet inside, teachers made last-minute preparations to classrooms. Karen Bishop, who teaches third grade, placed notebooks and folders on desks aligned in groups of four.
Bishop has experienced 14 “first days” of school as a teacher, but she said this particular one was special.
“It’s really exciting,” she said. “There’s been a lot of build-up and a lot of work involved at this point—a lot of thinking about this school for about a year and knowing it was coming.”
As students found their classrooms, staff members were making sure everything else was in place, too. Office aide Chris McGurrin found one problem: a copy machine for teacher use had been placed in a maintenance and storage room which was always locked.
McGurrin came to Workman along with Principal Jim Burt, with whom she worked at Erikkson Elementary.
“I decided I needed an adventure,” she said, before leaving to tell Burt the copier had to be moved. “This is just fantastic. I can’t wait to see (the school) filled with children—that’s the best part.”
She walked past the library, where it was clear some other things weren’t yet in place: the books have arrived, but the shelves to hold them all have not.
If all goes as planned, everything will be settled by the time the school hosts the official dedication ceremony on Sept. 25.
Back outside, the buses had arrived. Burt stopped to greet each one as they stacked through the parking lot. As students stepped off, they found teachers wearing blue t-shirts who told them who they’re teacher would be this year.
Cars filled the lot, such as that of Canton resident Debbie Magill. She led her youngest daughter, Jessica, to her fifth grade class.
“She was very excited to come; she wasn’t nervous,” said Magill. “She had met the principal before the end of the year last year and she absolutely loved (him),” she said.
Magill said she and her husband moved to Canton for the schools, and was excited that her daughter would get the benefit of the new facility. She also has a senior at Plymouth High School and an eighth grader at Discovery Middle School.
Finally, one by one, the lines of students paraded into the school before the bell at 8:48 a.m. It was all very calm and orderly—the first day, noted Bishop, was all about learning the rules and procedures.
Back at the cross walk, Galanty helped another group traverse Cherry Hill. When they had reached the other side, but while Galanty still stood in the middle of the road, a minivan turned right on red, from Denton onto Cherry Hill. The driver was promptly pulled over by a Canton police officer stationed a hundred yards away.
Everybody has to follow the rules.
