Sara Johnson, the principal of Markham Elementary, greeted students with smiles, high-fives, and words of encouragement as they arrived at the Markham Avenue school on Thursday morning, which marked the start of the school year for Vacaville Unified.
She greeted a group of students she recognized from the previous year with a “Hey, you guys,” and then wished them a “Have a great day.” Behind her, an arrangement of teal, white, and black balloons marked the entrance to the school’s asphalt playground, all under a brilliant blue sky with temperatures hovering in the upper 60s.
The upbeat atmosphere extended throughout the TK-6 school and even into the first class, as students and teachers connected, discussed classroom guidelines and what they expected from each other, went over the academic year’s plan, and, naturally, located the bathrooms and front office.
Johnson, the principal of the school district’s biggest elementary school with 900 students and a fluent Spanish speaker, expressed that she, along with the students and parents she consulted, were “excited” to start the 2025-26 school year at the Vacaville school famous for its Spanish/English Peer Immersion and Cultural Education program, also known as SPICE.
Trystan and Brandi Roberts enrolled their two sons at Orchard Elementary: Atlas, age 5, who is in kindergarten, and Valor, age 4, who is in transitional kindergarten (TK).
When questioned about what he anticipated most on his first day, Atlas responded, “I’m eager to study Spanish and make new acquaintances.”
Close by, Yen Chue had his 7-year-old daughter, Jasmine Chue, take a picture with the Timberwolf mascot, who was wearing a costume and holding a large heart, to capture the memory.
In Room 14, Norma Guerrero-Rubio, a third-grade teacher, greeted 24 students in her SPICE class. They all took their places on the floor, each in a designated, numbered spot, listening intently to everything she said.
While calling attendance, Guerrero-Rubio inquired about each student’s preferred name. She seemed familiar with several students already, and then asked those with siblings at Markham to stand. Over six students rose.
She once highlighted what she called her “most important rule,” which was, “You cannot sit next to someone you know.” Then, using her thumb and fingers, she gestured to indicate talking and added, “You can talk on the playground.”
Guerrero-Rubio adorned the upper reaches of her classroom walls with signs in both Spanish and English, proclaiming: Ser Seguro/Be Safe; Ser Respetuoso/Be Respectful; and Ser Responsable/Be Responsible.
Superintendent Ed Santopadre, who got to the school at 9 a.m., one hour following the 8 a.m. assembly where students gathered behind signs indicating their classroom numbers and teachers, reported that the 18-school district’s enrollment had risen to 12,700 this year, partially because of a larger number of transitional kindergarten (TK) students at Orchard and Callison elementary schools.
While it’s good news for VUSD, some other Solano area school districts are experiencing decreased enrollments and school closures. Still, other parts of the state, by some accounts, are reporting boosts in student populations, with those numbers coming at a time when, according to the education news organization EdSource, California does not have enough qualified teachers.
However, Santopadre mentioned that VUSD either has sufficient qualified teachers on staff or, similar to previous years, has employed individuals with temporary certifications. These emergency credentials enable the district to fill open positions while the teachers, all of whom hold college degrees, pursue their full teaching credentials.
“Hiring was easier this year,” he said.
In the school’s multipurpose room, which also houses the cafeteria, manager Rosemary Vargas showed off breakfast foods and stacks of fresh lunch foods, including broccoli and sliced red pepper that would be topped with chicken slices and tomato sauce; turkey sandwiches; peaches and grapes; and green salad.
The school meals, free to all students, are made from scratch, using mostly fresh ingredients, she added. By any stretch, the food offerings appeared to be a world away from student lunches their parents — and certainly their grandparents — would recall.
At Buckingham Collegiate Charter Academy, Principal Samantha Working escorted a visitor to the McClellan Street high school’s choir room. There, music teacher Jeremy Kreamer led 14 students in a rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” He also led them in the singng of scales (Do-Re-Mi) forward and backward, the sound smooth, full and resonant. Working said the school’s choir members sing the national anthem at special campus occasions and assemblies.
English II teacher Jason Cokley introduced himself to 18 students in one of his midmornng classes, his room stocked with literature such as Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged,” Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” (the No Fear Shakespeare version), George Bernard Shaw’s play “Pygmalion” (the basis for the musical “My Fair Lady”), Alan Paton’s apartheid saga “Cry, The Beloved Country,” and Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities.”
A notable sign in Cokley’s room read “When things go wrong, don’t go with them.”
In Toby Spencer’s chemistry class, a few doors down, he introduced 17 students to the branch of science that deals with the identification of the substances of which matter is made of and the ways in which they interact, combine and change, among other things.
On a white board, he asked students to write about what they knew about the periodic table, the tabular arrangement of chemical elements, organized by increasing atomic number. He also listed a guide for students to follow in a chemical demonstration.
Along the walls were cautionary signs. One read, “Wait for your teacher’s instructions before touching station materials,” while another read, “Wash hands thoroughly during and after the lab,” and still another, “Don’t put anything in your mouth.”
At Jepson Middle School on Elder Street, the daytime home to nearly 1,000 seventh and eighth graders, an increase from 960 students last year, Principal Melissa Mainini escorted a visitor to teacher Clint Birch’s seventh grade English class.
Using a slide projection, he detailed three “classroom goals.” 1. Make the school a better place; 2. Improvise, adapt and overcome; and 3. Everyone passes the Benchmark Writing Tests.
“How many of you have written an argumentative essay last year?” Birch, a former coach of Vacaville High’s state championship wrestling team, asked at one point. A few raised their hands.
In Brad Winsor’s Integrated Math 1 class, he told 35 students the class was, essentially, at a ninth-grade level.
He said some college applications include a question about whether students have taken integrated math. He also laid out class rules and had them fill out a get-to-know-you questionnaire that sought answers to “Most memorable event from summer?” to “What do you like to do when you are not at school (sports, hobbies)?” to “One interesting fact about you?”
Seated in her office, Mainini said she welcomed 500 new seventh graders. Her hope for the coming year, she added, was to “find opportunities to get them (all students) involved.”
“There are so many ways to connect to the school community,” she said. “We only have them for two years and they find their place.”
Jared Austin, co-founder and superintendent/CEO of Kairos Public Schools, said Thursday enrollments have increased at the TK-11 school, to 870 students, with some at the Elm Street campus and the older students at the newer Sunflower Street campus, home to the high school students and Kairos Innovative Scholars Pathways students (K-8), he said in a text to The Reporter.
As he wrote, construction crews were making progress on grading an expansive adjacent area for a sports complex, to be completed in November, and a new classroom building that will be completed in May.
Founded in 2013, Kairos is an independent charter school, with its own governing board, but aligned with VUSD for some purposes, including financial oversight.
