With schools damaged or destroyed by the Camp fire, many children will head to unfamiliar locations next week

Just before the Camp fire came upon Paradise, Jori Krulder, an English teacher, was at the town’s high school.

She spent the morning of 8 November in her classroom at Paradise high – and it was there Krulder and her students first saw the ash and leaves raining down.

And it was from the school that they fled.

The Camp fire, which grew to 250 sq miles before it was fully contained this week, destroyed nearly 14,000 homes – including Krulder’s – and damaged or destroyed most schools in Paradise.

Some, like Paradise elementary, were completely destroyed. Others incurred so much damage they may have to be rebuilt entirely.

About 32,000 children have been out of school because of air quality and displacement, including 5,000 from Paradise, Magalia and Concow, the foothill communities affected by the fire.

For Krulder, the days since the fire spent out of school have been challenging. She’s stayed in a stranger’s house with her family, and longed to return to the classroom where she taught for 16 years.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A sign hangs on a wall at the Paradise elementary school, destroyed by the Camp fire. Photograph: John Locher/AP

“That’s been the hardest thing,” she said. “You’d think it be losing my house, but it’s really being away from my students.”

They have seen each other since then, but they will officially reunite on 3 December when Butte county schools reopen for the first time since the fire began. Local school officials have scrambled to find classrooms for most of the displaced students and their teachers in the valley communities of Chico, Durham and Oroville.

“We look at this as one mission to get 32,000 kids back to school and get them in the best environment possible,” Tim Taylor, the Butte county office of education superintendent, said.

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Students from Magalia, the small community just north of Paradise, will be able to return to their schools, which were untouched by fire. But they’ll face long bus rides as the main road into town is still closed.

Paradise elementary school students will have the option of reuniting with their teachers and classmates at schools hosting them in Durham and Oroville. Middle school and high school students will work in a hybrid learning model, doing most of their work online and meeting with teachers as needed in the local mall until a more permanent plan is announced in January. Meanwhile charter schools, such as Achieve Charter and Core Butte, will host their students in churches and other buildings in Chico.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Sarah Gronseth kisses her dog Branch in a parking lot in Chico. Gronseth, a teacher, evacuated some of her high school students in her truck as the fire bore down on the high school in Paradise. Photograph: John Locher/AP

Long-term plans are still in development for most schools, but resuming classes will bring students back into schools and provide the routine that most have lacked since the fire began.

“It’s some sort of normalcy,” Krulder said. “[School] is their everyday thing. That’s what they do. That’s their life.”

Some students aren’t joining their classmates, at least not yet. About 260 paradise students have registered with Chico unified school district, the largest district in the county, Superintendent Kelly Staley said.

Krulder’s students celebrate winning an academic decathlon. Photograph: Courtesy Jori Krulder

Becky K, a student services professional at a local college, said she didn’t know what her two sons, 11 and 15, would do long term. The family, who lost their home in the fire, is looking at opportunities in Chico and letting the boys decide where they want to go to school.

“Our plan is to still have them to go the schools they were part of before the event,” Becky said. “But it’s still unknown. We need to get back to our normal routine but Paradise is not the same place it was three weeks ago.”

Becky’s family, like so many others displaced by the fire, is taking it one day at a time, and she’s trying to let her sons process what happened in the fire. Going back to school might help with that, she said. That’s what county officials are hoping; nearly every teacher in the county has undergone training on trauma and mental health in recent days to allow them to better help students.

“We’re preparing as much as we can,” Taylor said. “But I don’t think anyone can fully prepare for what’s coming up.”

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“Emotional support for students is an important part of the recovery process,” said Steve Mizera, an assistant superintendent with Santa Rosa City schools. When fire hit Santa Rosa last year, 85 staff members from the district and more than 800 students lost their homes.

Many families seemed to be experiencing post-traumatic stress after those fires, Mizera said. The district started providing expanded counseling and support services, and has offered them over the winter and summer breaks since.

Butte county has gotten some advice from districts that helped students return to school following last year’s fires in Santa Rosa, but the scale of its own crisis is unprecedented.

“This was much much bigger and much more intense,” Taylor said. “We’re in uncharted waters.”