Today is the first day of instruction at RCHS, but I didn’t get to meet my classes. Apparently, things were so complicated that the school admin decided to leave an old schedule in place for the first few days of school and wait until they know how many students are enrolled before setting the schedule this weekend. This old schedule did not have me assigned to any classes.

But I didn’t know that when I showed up this morning and found a bunch of other confused teachers and students who didn’t know what classes they have. Many students were shuffled to a homeroom and some were given schedules; many students were sent to offices to have schedules made for them. I spoke to a veteran teacher and math coach and she told me that she has never seen a school as chaotic on the first day of school as this one. One teacher showed up this morning and was told to switch offices. Another teacher was told to go to another school to find a job.

Wow. Never a dull day in public school, I suppose.

But some progress was made today–at least I got to meet some students as I visited various classrooms and wandered the halls. There were clearly some students who didn’t look too pleased to be at school, but most of them did. I met one 12th grader who is taking calculus who told me not to trust any of the students at this school. It’s too soon for me to get jaded, though.

I also managed to get keys. There won’t be much point in going to school Thursday or Friday this week until they know what classes I’ll be teaching so I guess I have a few extra days to goof off.. oh, errr i mean, get other stuff done. I’m still looking forward to Monday.