Perry County superintendent discusses new school year, long term recovery

Superintendent Jonathan Jett says it's nice to have students back in the classroom given all the area has been through in the past several weeks

PERRY COUNTY, Ky (WTVQ)- School districts in some of the hardest hit flooding regions are welcoming back students to the classroom this month.
In Perry County, two of the hardest hit schools started back this week.

Superintendent Jonathan Jett says it’s nice to have students back in the classroom given all the area has been through in the past several weeks. But he admits, the start of the school year has been stressful as they look at long-term rebuilding.

“It’s great to see their smiling faces again,” said Jett, who helped welcome back students Tuesday morning.

It’s now been more than a month since devastating flooding impacted parts of eastern Kentucky. Among the damage were two schools in Perry County, Buckhorn School and Robinson Elementary.

Students from those schools have now combined under one roof. Jett says the district worked through Labor Day to make sure a temporary facility, the formerly AB Combs elementary school, was good to go.

“There’s been so much work that had to be done to that school in the last three weeks. We spent I think 24 days when we started the initial work of reopening that school until we reopened yesterday. There’s H-VAC, there’s LED lighting, new ceiling tiles hanged throughout the building,” said Jett.

Now,  Jett says some of the short term issues the district is facing includes improving the car line up and drop off process. So far, the district is not having issues with virtual students or bus routes getting to students in impacted areas.

“The county and state have done an excellent job of getting our roads where we can at least pick up all the students. Now they might not all be clear, but we can go in different routes and make sure that we can get to the students to pick them up,” said Jett.

There are also long-term issues the district is dealing with.

“The Buckhorn School, based on what we’ve been told by structural engineers is just kind of a renovation. That’s going to be a big renovation that will require a lot of work. But I look for both schools to be at this current facility for at least this entire school year.”

Jett says leaders are still figuring out the next steps, including the rebuilding process for Robinson elementary.

“That would require acquiring property, purchasing property and things of that nature, so that’s a longer process,” said Jett.

Jett says students are going to be taking a mental health survey in the coming days that will alert leaders of students suffering from things like depression and anxiety. The results will be communicated to parents to see how students can be helped while healing from the trauma.