MCPS opened back up the doors to the schools on Mar. 15, allowing around 20,000 students to return to in-person learning. This is the first time students have been in schools in a year. The MCPS Board of Education voted unanimously to slowly phase students back into in-person school beginning early March.

The first students allowed back were the students in special programs such as the autism K-12 program, special schools and extension programs. They will be followed by grades K-3. After that comes grades 4-6, and grade 12, which will be phased in no later than Apr. 6. Then grades 8, 9, and 11, who will be phased in no later than April 19. Finally grades 7 and 10 will be phased in by no later than Apr. 19, per a BOE announcement on Mar. 23.

Students were given a choice to stay at home and continue online learning or to go back to in-person school. Although results were split, many students are tired of online school and eager to get back in the classroom. “I hope students get a chance to go back to school because I’m tired of being stuck in my room on Zoom. I want to go back to classrooms and be in a school learning environment again,” sophomore Maya Gottesman said.

For the seniors, many of them wanted to return in person because it’s their last year of high school and they would rather spend it with their friends in school, than sitting in a Zoom class online. “I want to get a chance to go back to school because I want to spend my last few months of high school with my friends in classrooms. This is the last time I’ll be in high school and I want to have some good memories of it, not just remembering it as online school,” senior Jack Grange said.

Freshman are in a weird situation because they haven’t been in the new building yet. They are set to be the second grade going back to high school. Freshman students have mixed emotions on going in person. “I’m excited to go back to school, but at the same time I’m also nervous because I don’t know the building. But I want to go back because I want to get to know the high school experience and learn my way around the building, so I don’t get lost next year,” freshman Matthew Repie said.

While some students want to go back in person, others like being online. “I like being online for school because I get to sleep in later than normal and have less work. If we get a choice to go back to school or not, I’m definitely staying home,” sophomore Sam Gross said.