PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — For Dakota West, this is not just a new year.
She’s also starting at a brand new school.
“I’m scared. I don’t have any friends here. I don’t know anyone," she said.
Standing outside East Lake High School, West waited for the one person she knew and asked for some help from one of the seniors.
“You seem like you have a great personality. You are going to make a lot of friends," I told her.
“I hope so,” she said.
Math teacher Karin David greeted students as they returned.
“We are so over the moon. We are so ready to be back. The kids are ready to be back. We’re thrilled," she said.
And the East Lake marching band is already in tune, welcoming students back.
Pinellas County Schools Superintendent Kevin Hendrick also came to East Lake to do the same.
Earlier in the morning, he talked live on ABC Action News at the bus depot about his favorite first-day memories.
“Anytime students get to go back and see something new, their school has changed. So I can remember as a student at Largo High School going when the campus was being redone, and you get back to school, and you say, 'Wow, look at these new things.' So I think at Clearwater High School, brand new school, students will go back and see that fresh newness at school," said Hendrick.
Start times at several Pinellas schools were changed this summer with the hope of making bus routes more efficient.
At East Lake, that means the middle school now starts more than two hours earlier to align with the high school.