MARYSVILLE — It was a day of firsts in many ways for many Marysville parents.

The first day of the 2011-12 school year for the Marysville School District also marked the first year that the students of Tulalip Elementary went to the Quil Ceda Elementary school building.

Luis Alvarado escorted his daughter, fourth-grader Valentina, and his son, first-grader Luis Fernando, to the Marysville Secondary Campus on Sept. 6 for the first time, where he expressed his concerns about the schools’ Adequate Yearly Progress. To that end, he hopes to enroll his kids in the Marysville Cooperative Education Program.

Until this year, all seven of Samantha Jimicum’s children had gone through the former Tulalip Elementary campus. While three of her kids have since entered high school and two are in middle school now, she dropped off the remaining two at the Quil Ceda Elementary school building, where she and Quil Ceda Elementary parent Winona Shopbell commiserated over how the first day of school hasn’t gotten any easier for either of them.

“I always cry,” Jimicum laughed. “This summer went by way too fast. I don’t know what I’ll do with myself. I’ll have to clean the house by myself.”

Shopbell has four children, but this year marked the first that Shopbell’s daughter wasn’t able to attend elementary school alongside her cousins, who started seventh grade at Totem Middle School this year.

“She didn’t want me to leave,” Shopbell said. “She cried, so I cried.”

In spite of how much they missed their kids, just minutes after the first bell, both moms took comfort in the number of school staff members who were available to direct students and parents both outside the school and within its hallways.

“I’m getting old,” Eddie Pablo laughed, as he held his son Damon, who started kindergarten at Quil Ceda Elementary this year. “He’s been ready and anxious for this.”

Liberty Elementary parent David Perrin could sympathize, as he helped daughter Kailani unpack her school supplies in her first-grade classroom.

“All I can think is, she’s growing up fast,” David Perrin said. “It’s fun, though.”

Kailani looks forward to reading more books during the school year, but every student has their own favorite parts of going back to school. Fellow Liberty Elementary students J.C. Pablo and Thomas Neiser agreed that they were a bit nervous about their first day, but their insights were otherwise quite different.

“It’s fun to see everybody,” said J.C. Pablo, who started third grade and counts PE among his favorite subjects. “Kids should have fun, as long as they know it’s going to be harder, so they should be ready. I got plenty of sleep last night. I went to bed early and woke up early.”

“I don’t know how to explain it,” said Thomas Neiser, a fifth-grader who’s looking forward to art class. “I’m nervous, but it’s a fun nervous. I wanted another day of summer like my little brother, who starts kindergarten tomorrow.”

Thomas anticipated that little brother Caden would make trouble for his teachers, which Thomas advised against.

“You should never be mean to your teachers,” Thomas Neiser said.

Thomas’ mom Tiffany admitted to overlooking a few documents that she needed to check in Caden, since she was out of practice as a kindergarten mom.

“Make sure you have his birth certificate,” Tiffany Neiser laughed. “I forgot it just like the first time. It’s all new again.”

Oz and Sarah Sahin, by contrast, felt like they’d developed a comfortable routine, after dropping one child off at Liberty Elementary and seeing the other head off to Marysville Getchell High School.

“It gets easier,” Oz Sahin said. “Maybe not waking up so early in the morning after a long summer, but seeing the smiles on their faces when they come home, as they say, ‘Oh, I did this and I did that, and it was so cool.'”

“It’s still exciting,” Sarah Sahin said. “Both of our kids like school a lot, and we like the Marysville School District a lot.”

Liberty Elementary Principal Scott Irwin believes the first day at his school went well.

“It’s always controlled chaos, but I think it went off very smoothly,” Irwin said. “It’s one of my favorite days of the year. Parents and kids alike are excited by the buzz of it. It’s a fresh start that brings the community back together. I had a hard time sleeping last night.”

MSD Superintendent Dr. Larry Nyland visited multiple schools throughout the day, ducking his head into at least 50 classrooms before lunch to welcome students back and wish them a fruitful new school year.

“We’re off to a great start with lots of enthusiastic students, teachers, secretaries, bus drivers and parents,” Nyland said. “Our custodians and groundskeepers have worked hard, alongside parent and staff volunteers, to get the schools ready, and our teachers are reviewing their expectations and summer reading, and making our students feel known, welcomed and safe.”

Nyland reported that this year’s classrooms are larger than usual, with 28-30 students per elementary classroom and more than 30 students in each secondary classroom, which the district had expected due to state budget cuts.

“It’s too early to tell about enrollment, but early signs look strong,” said Nyland, who noted that students are counted during each of the first four days of school, since students must be physically present on at least one of those four days for the district to receive state funding. “When students start one week late, we welcome them and teach them as we do all our other students, but we receive no state funding for that month for that student.”

Nyland touted the freshly painted portables, new fencing and a soon-to-be new playground for ECEAP at Shoultes Elementary, which he credited to the hard work of ECEAP parents and maintenance workers, as well as a grant. This year’s new partnership between Marshall Elementary and the Co-op was likewise marked by new parking, driveways and signage.

“With summer work, we have a few more parking spaces this year at Marshall than we did last year at Quil Ceda,” Nyland said.