Heather Plemmons • HPS Principal Hayesville Primary School PTO treated HPS staff to ice cream during the school prep days. From left, Annie Brooks, Tori Canterbury and Jill Cherry take an ice cream break.
By Lorrie Ross
Staff Writer
The first official day of school may be Monday, Aug. 26 for Clay County students, but teachers and other staff have been on the job for several days. School staff has enjoyed games, enrichment time and food, along with mandatory training.
On Friday, Aug. 16 school staff participated in “The Big Game Show” to kick off their school year in a fun way. Some of their training included ongoing safety training by the Clay County Sheriff’s Office and partners, as well as substance misuse training courtesy of Tobin Lee from MountainWise and Mark Pilon from Mountain Projects.
At press time, Clay County Schools had 1,320 students registered to start classes for the fall 2024 semester. The official numbers always change a little after school starts because other students will enroll, while some may have moved away.
Heather Plemmons, principal of Hayesville Primary School, said HPS has 372 students enrolled. Hayesville Primary is the first stop for students beginning their school career in Clay County. The school houses students who are pre-kindergarten through second grade.
As usual, the pre-K and kindergarten students will not all start on Monday when other students begin their school year; start dates will be staggered over the first three days of school for them.
“Their teachers have contacted them to let the parents know which day their student attends during those staggered days,” Plemmons explained. “We are very excited to welcome our returning students and our newly enrolled kindergarten and pre-k students to HPS. It is going to be a great year.”
In addition to HPS, Clay County Schools has three other schools on its campus. Hayesville Elementary currently has 277 students enrolled to begin grades three through five. At press time, enrollment for Hayesville Middle School was 302 for students in grades sixth through eighth. Meanwhile, Hayesville High School has 371 students from grade nine freshmen to grade 12, seniors.
According to Clay Schools Superintendent Melissa Godfrey, families will have to make a few adjustments for the new school year. Due to construction on campus, there are new traffic patterns for student drop-off and pickup. Those who have not seen the instructions about the new configuration, can watch the YouTube link, also found on the Clay Schools Facebook page- https://youtu.be/HmbUEMRVKFs?si=LT0YCJndVtLcDKR3.
“We ask for patience and cooperation with our traffic challenges during construction,” Godfrey added. “Everyone working together will make these challenges easier to manage.”
Godfrey said there are no health restrictions to start the school year. Yet there are some attendance policy updates which allow more flexibility with the acceptance of parent notes and the procedures for submitting them, as well as some additional information about how course retention or failure may be treated as the result of absences. Details about policy 4400 and 4440-r are available on the school website. Parents will also receive fliers outlining the updated attendance regulations.
Godfrey ended, “We are so excited to welcome students back. Overall, we’ve spent lots of time this summer preparing for another great year and look forward to putting those plans into action.”
The words of Hayesville High School Principal Stacey Overlin seem to echo the sentiments of all administrators and other staff. “We are looking forward to a great 2024-25 school year.”
Oh and for those kids and families who cannot wait for another holiday, they get a day off one week after school starts. Labor Day is Monday, Sept. 2.