DECATUR - Not all of the tears seen on the first day at Baum School belonged to the children.

Hope Eubanks said her son saw her nose getting red and insisted that if she was going to cry, she had to drop him off before they got to school.

"I'm sad," Eubanks said. "It's the end of summer."

School began Wednesday in Decatur with a half day. The first full day is today.

Eubanks' children, in third and fifth grade at Baum, were ready for school to start, she said.

Some children weren't as sure. Here and there, a sobbing child clung to mommy, unwilling to let her leave. Other children were far more confident.

"Can I kiss you, or are you too big for that?" one mother asked her first-grade son, who submitted to a peck on the cheek but otherwise was quite at ease waiting outside Joanne Sperry's classroom all by himself until some of his classmates showed up.

"High School Musical" backpacks are plainly the most popular among the elementary schoolgirls, and Samantha Murphy was no exception. She also was wearing a "High School Musical" shirt. The second-grader loves Gabrielle, one of the characters.

"It's their 'Grease,' " said her mother, Shannon Murphy. "I had 'Grease'; they have 'High School Musical.' "

Gabrielle, Murphy explained for those not in the know, is roughly equivalent to the character of Sandy in "Grease."

Baum School had a face lift over the summer, and children came back to a new paint job and new mats.

"Do you like our 'new' school?" Principal Debbie Bandy asked. "It's purple."

Down the street at Thomas Jefferson Middle School, staff were stationed outside in the parking lot to welcome students back, with others in the halls to direct traffic.

This first day, Principal Shannen Ray said, students would stay with their homeroom teacher for the entire half day of school. Seventh-graders spent the morning learning school rules and where their classes will be, while eighth-graders decided on team names and mottos. Students at Jefferson are grouped into four academic teams, two each in seventh and eighth grades.

Cassidy Hicks, an eighth-grader, said she remembered how nervous she was last year. She worried about finding her way around. This year, she's an old hand, looking forward to sports.

"Volleyball, basketball, track," she said, ticking them off on her fingers.

Jefferson also is enjoying air conditioning, thanks to maintenance workers who discovered a cooling system in the building and, with a little tweaking, managed to make it operate as air conditioning.

"I think the students will be a lot happier," Ray said.

vwells@herald-review.com|421-7982.