The 2020 school year is mercifully over.
Friday was the last day of distance learning for thousands of students and teachers in the Sweetwater Union High School and Chula Vista Elementary School Districts.
However, the faculty at Discovery Elementary School in Chula Vista didn’t want to end 2020 by clicking "LEAVE MEETING." The charter school hosted a drive-through holiday party for its students instead.
“We’re giving a little bit of our joy to see them,” said an emotional kindergarten teacher Lupita Avendaño.
For many teachers like Donna Demott, it was the first time they’ve seen their students face-to-face in months, and in some cases ever.
“And when they see you it’s, ‘Hi Miss Donna!’ ‘Hi, Michael!’ They know you,” exclaimed Demott.
Christmas music blared through the Chula Vista neighborhood, the school’s parking lot was decorated with inflatable characters and teachers wore the ugliest sweaters in their closets.
Avendaño may have needed the party more than her students.
“It’s hard to explain,” she said, sniffling behind a face mask and clear plastic shield. “It’s a lot of joy. The fact that we don’t see them, that we can’t hug them.”
2020 was hard.
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“It’s going. It’s going. We go day by day,” said Avendaño.
The faculty also handed each student a bag of goodies that also included a little homework to keep them busy until school starts up again in 2021.
