Bittersweet farewell to school year for some

LYNN – The mood was decidedly different at two elementary schools Thursday as another school year came to an end.Outside the Ingalls School, singing and chatter could be heard, but inside not everyone was happy.”I’m sad,” said fourth-grader Jermanny Guerrero. “I won’t see my friends for three months.”Guerrero said he is off to summer camp for the first time and possibly to visit an uncle in Texas, which will leave little time to see friends. Third-grader Angeline Pojoy didn’t quite share Jermanny’s state of mind. She said she would miss her friends but she wouldn’t miss getting up for classes every day.View photos from the last day of schoolDiego Iraheta said his best memories from his year in third grade were from science class, where he learned about earth and other planets.When asked if he was looking forward to fourth grade, Diego admitted, “I’m a little nervous.”Jermanny, however, said he was ready for fifth grade.”I’m confident in myself,” he said with a small smile.Principal Irene Cowdell is also already looking forward to next year. Cowdell just wrapped up her first year as principal, which she characterized as “awesome.” She credited her staff, parents and other principals for making her first year a breeze, and said she is already working on ideas for next year.As Cowdell closed out her first year as principal, Diane Logue was boxing up after 19 years as a kindergarten teacher at the Ford School, where the mood was decidedly more somber.”This school has a lot of history for my family,” she said. “My parents taught here, met here and married. When I first came here my mother was still teaching fourth while I taught kindergarten.”The kindergarten programs at Ford, Brickett and Tracy elementary schools are moving into what is being called The Early Education Center in Lynn Vocational Technical Institute annex. Logue could have moved with the program but chose to move to Shoemaker Elementary instead. She has ties to Shoemaker because it is closer to her home, she went there as a child and so did her children, but it does not make leaving Ford any easier, she said.”We would always go to the fifth grade graduation, we go back so far with all the families; they all know us,” she said. “It was very emotional this year.”She said she will also miss stopping by the first grade on the first day of school to see how her former students did over the summer.”One of the hardest things is leaving her,” Logue said, pointing to Principal Claire Crane. “She is our mentor. She has created this environment where families thrive ?This this the only school I’ve taught in, except for substitute teaching and three weeks at Ingalls.”For Crane, Thursday marked her 52nd last day of school, and it was markedly different from her first, she noted.”The first time there were so many exciting things and accomplishments,” she said. “Today is chaotic, we’re getting ready for repairs and losing teachers. It’s heartbreaking to see a lot of these changes.”Both Cowdell and Crane said they would miss their students over the summer but some would be back in two weeks time for summer school, which will be held at the Ingalls but include students from Ford.”We have a great curriculum from National Geographic,” Cowdell said. “There will be a lot of non-fiction and math standards, but they will also study classic fairy tales, so it will be fun.”Chris Stevens can be reached at [email protected].