The long, hot days of summer are now over for students. School is back.

“I expect things to run smoothly. I expect things to be successful. I’m looking forward to it,” said Orangeburg-Wilkinson English teacher Melissa Amaker-Morgan of the new school year.

As students began roaming the hallways, teachers across The T&D Region spent the first week of school establishing expectations and implementing new wrinkles to help student achievement.

While some like second grade Edisto Primary student Terryon Middleton are eager to learn science, others such as Orangeburg Prep senior class President Margaret Godowns are looking at colleges.

“I’m so excited,” she said.

Here’s a look at three schools in Orangeburg County and to expect this year.

Orangeburg Prep

Peace, love and happiness.

It’s not a theme for another Woodstock; it is the mantra the Orangeburg Prep class of 2009 will live by this year.

It has become tradition for every senior class at OPS to adopt a theme as it enters the final stanza of high school careers. Thursday morning, OPS seniors entered the school dressed up in tie-dye headbands, large aviator sunglasses and long-haired wigs as they were cheered on by teachers, parents and underclassmen.

“It went way better than I thought it was going to go,” Godowns said.

To live up to their theme, OPS seniors plan to raise awareness for the ravaged Darfur region of the Sudan, send soccer balls to a school in Malawi, make the campus “green” and enhance school spirit.

“We wanted to have a theme that meant something,” said OPS Student Body President Mason Hay, wearing a black wig reminiscent of Bob Marley.

Headmaster Kelly Mims said OPS has three main goals for the 2008-09 year. The first is to implement more technology on campus, such as online courses for classes not available at OPS. Parents will also be able to access their children’s grades and attendance from the school’s Web site while students can check on their assignments.

Another target is to improve test scores in advance-placement courses and college entrance exams.

“We want them to be able to get into the colleges they want to get into,” Mims said.

The final goal is to go “green” by recycling, keeping the campus clean and not wasting energy.

New at OPS this year are the art athletic room, a peer-to-peer tutoring program, a new student learning center and writing courses for freshmen and sophomores.

“We want each of our students at our school to feel like we have given them the tools to be successful,” Mims said.

Orangeburg-Wilkinson High School

“This has been the best opening experience I’ve ever had in my 14 years in education,” O-W Principal Gregory McCord said.

McCord wants to keep the momentum up as the school year progresses by establishing three expectations of his students: come to school every day, be on time and do your best.

The incoming freshman class has a different attitude, according to O-W Student Body President Lamaria Jamison.

Amaker-Morgan attributes that to the two orientations for freshmen that took place prior to the first week of school.

She said those sessions allowed teachers “to find out who they are and develop relationships with them.”

The school will use several credit-recovery programs to afford every student ample opportunity to graduate. In addition, there will be after-school and weekend programs to complement the credit-recovery courses.

There are some new things at the county’s largest high school, including the use of a Smartboard that allows teachers to give interactive presentations to students.

Students at O-W can expect to take the Measure of Academic Progress test several times this year to assess strengths and weaknesses in different subjects.

The school also sports a fresh new look as the walls have either been repainted or feature murals.

Jamison said a greater emphasis will be placed on school pride this year.

McCord invites parents to come and take a look at the remarkable differences at the school.

“We expect to reach levels that we have not reached before at Orangeburg-Wilkinson High School,” McCord said.

Edisto Primary School

At Edisto Primary, the name of the game is getting students academically ready at an early age.

In the globalized economy, that means getting children acclimated to computers and the Internet through the school’s technology lab.

The school hired a certified instructor for the lab who will teach students keyboarding, PowerPoint presentations and interactive activities on the Internet.

Parents of second-graders can expect to see a different style of report card that breaks down a child’s performance in certain areas of a subject. Performance will be rated on a sliding scale of four to one, with a score of four being the best.

For example, a student in English/language arts may score a four in reading comprehension but only merit a two in writing.

“It really breaks down what they’re good at and what they’re not good at,” said Kathy Moore, a literacy coach at Edisto Primary.

Edisto Primary first implemented the different report card for kindergarten and first-grade students last year.

Assistant Principal Valesta Twitty said the school will place great emphasis on teaching literacy in all classes from math to music.

This year teachers will send students home with books to read to their parents. Students will be placed in smaller groups in English/language arts classes according to their reading level as established by testing.

Teacher Charlene Gleaton is in charge of a new program designed to help students transition into second grade. Gleaton said the program will boost their reading and math performance.

Twitty said everybody is excited to return to school.

“Things have just gone smoothly,” Twitty said.

Second-grader Hayden Player was elated to return to school. Her favorite class is physical education because she likes to play all kinds of sports.

But her favorite part of being back is seeing other students.

“I like making new friends,” she said.

T&D Staff Writer Lee Tant can be reached by e-mail at ltant@timesanddemocrat.com or by phone at 803-534-1060.

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