By NEAL WAGNER / Managing Editor

ALABASTER – For Kingwood Christian School senior Buddy Kittrell, Aug. 12 came with mixed emotions. While he was excited to begin his final year of high school, he was also a bit apprehensive about parting ways with his longtime friends at the end of the year.

“It’s a great feeling. I’m looking forward to graduation,” Kittrell said when asked about his final first day of school. “I love the people here. They just seem closer than they do at a public school. It’s kind of a small school, so everybody knows everybody.”

His classmate, Joshua Edge, shared similar feelings.

“It’s been so easy to make friends,” Edge said, noting he has gone to KCS “most of (his) life.”

Kittrell and Edge are members of one of the largest – if not the largest – senior classes ever at Kingwood, said school Principal Ruth Gray. With a class of 47 seniors, Gray said she is expecting one of the largest graduation ceremonies the school has ever held in May.

“We have five grades totally full with waiting lists this year,” Gray said of the school’s enrollment of 360 students.

However, more students did not mean more chaos on the first day of school, Gray said.

“Everything has gone so smoothly. It’s been uneventful with very few surprises,” Gray said shortly before noon on Aug. 12. “But we have been preparing all summer for this day.”

Some of the summer preparations involved teacher development and long hours in the heat preparing the marching band for the 2015 football season.

“We’ve got so many exciting things going on. We spent a lot of time this summer developing the AP curriculum,” said KCS high school science teacher Chelsey Bartlett, noting she completed online professional development over the past few months.

KCS band teacher Tyra Cutcher was thankful to be in the air-conditioning after spending several days in the grueling Alabama heat during summer marching band camp.

“We have a silver screen (halftime show) theme this year, and they are excited about that,” Cutcher said of this year’s 22-member KCS marching band. “We’ve got a good group of kids.”