NEW ALBANY, IND. (WDRB) -- Students and teachers at the New Albany Floyd County School District will focus on more than just grades this year. Students and teachers will also work on building better relationships.
Eleven thousand New Albany Floyd County students are back to school at the district's nine elementary, three middle and two high schools. The students are joined by 600 teachers. At Scribner Middle School, those teachers have an added focus this year.
Principal Keith Bush explains, "We're working towards just making sure we focus on building relationships with kids. That's the most important part, these kids are our babies just as well as the parents' babies."
Bush says it started Monday with school staff providing extra help to students: "We're going to spend a lot of time in the classroom and out here making sure kids get to where they need to be."
The same is true at New Albany High School where hundreds of new faces are filling the halls and where Principal Janet Page says, "We do have 500 new freshmen, and in addition to that we have about 100 students who we didn't expect at the end of last school year that have now enrolled at New Albany."
Many of them will get help from their fellow students. A group of upperclassman called "Bulldog Leaders" are focusing extra time on helping the incoming freshmen. Senior student Phoebe Bauer says, "The orange shirts are so basically the freshman can recognize someone who can answer their."
While everyone will focus on helping one another this year, New Albany High School Principal Janet Page says everyone is still expected to follow the same simple school rules: "We expect great attendance and credits on transcripts, we expect all of our students to graduate."
Monday was also the first day of classes for Nelson County and Clarksville Community students.
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