‘We’ll be able to rebound’: Asheville students return to school after Hurricane Helene

ASHEVILLE, N.C. — Friends reunited and lessons restarted on Monday; for the first time since Hurricane Helene, students in Asheville were back in school.

Channel 9′s Education Reporter Jonathan Lowe was in Asheville for an emotional day cut short by a lingering shortage. While school buildings in Asheville escaped heavy damage, much of Asheville still doesn’t have access to clean drinking water.

School officials had to figure out a workaround before bringing students back, but everyone is feeling relief with a bit of normalcy.

“I’m happy to be back, see all of my friends, see everybody’s alright and survived,” said Kanihas Clinkscales, a senior in Asheville.

“Lots of hugs this morning as our kids are coming in, ‘cause they’ve missed us too, we’ve missed them,” said Asheville High School Principal Derek Edwards.

Weeks after flooding from Helene left parts of the city in ruins, Asheville City Schools reopened their campuses.

“We’ve got students who’ve lost their homes, we have staff who have lost their homes, lost family members,” Edwards said.

Clinkscales remembers where he left off in his studies the day before the storm hit.

“We were all putting in our college applications, we had senior meetings set up with our counselors,” Clinkscales told Lowe.

Edwards says that for now, the school day is only four hours long.

“It really hinged on water, how much water we could get to students,” Edwards said.

Lowe was there as Water Mission, a non-profit that usually sets up water systems in wartorn areas, installed a water filtration system. It means administrators can extend to full school days later this week.

“They’re filtering water and we are going to provide water on a constant basis for our students,” Edwards said.

Ceramics teacher Mindy McCormick says focusing on students’ social-emotional needs will be just as important.

“I’m not sure what students have experience, I’m not sure what level of trauma they endured,” McCormick said.

But with a month of instructional time wiped out, educators are assessing how much learning loss students have suffered.

“I’m really having a hard time deciding what to keep and what to take away because we’re not going to be able to do everything,” McCormick said.

Clinkscales said the COVID-19 pandemic taught his peers a valuable lesson in how to be resilient.

“We’ll be able to rebound, I think it’s mostly about how much work ethic we can put into getting back into the flow of things,” he said.

Buncombe County Schools, a separate district from Asheville City Schools, also returned to the classroom on Monday. They’re on a two-hour delay for the first week.

(VIDEO: Renewable tech is part of Helene’s disaster response, but what if it was there first?)

Renewable tech is part of Helene’s disaster response, but what if it was there first?

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