School is back, which means so are early-morning bus routes, late-night homework assignments and brown bag lunches.

Beaufort County Schools is transitioning back into the routine after a two-week Christmas break officially ended Monday.

Dale Cole, principal at Southside High School, said at the high school level, the main focus upon returning to school shifts to upcoming exams.

He said the North Carolina General Assembly’s K-12 calendar restrictions make it so that Christmas break comes before the end of the semester, and students only have a couple of weeks once they return in January to prepare for midterm exams.

“Mainly we welcome everybody back over the intercom the first morning. … We want to make sure we start with them having a clear understanding,” Cole said. “We focus their attention on the fact that exams, all exams, including state exams, will be coming in a couple of weeks.”

Southside staff also encourages students to give one last push before final grades come out at the end of the semester, he said.

Because of the break before exams, students’ grades can suffer, so it’s always a challenge to combat the exam-review rush upon returning, Cole said.

As for teachers, he said they are usually ready to get back to work, so the transition back to school doesn’t pose any problems for them.

“Typically they come back and that break does them a lot of good,” Cole said. “Teachers are (usually) type-A personality, and after two weeks, they’re typically ready to come back.”

By the first bell on Monday, the teachers have already thought about what to go over in class and how to prepare students for assessments.

“They’ve thought about what to cover between exams. … They feel the sense of urgency,” Cole said. “High school students, they can get used to vacation.”

But with each grade level, comes different experiences, and some of the elementary grades do not have to face the pressure of exams in January.

Keith Mitchell, assistant principal at John Cotten Tayloe, said his school has had a smooth transition back into the routine.

“Most everybody falls back right into the swing of things,” he said. “Most of the time everybody is ready to come back to be honest with you.”

According to Mitchell, even the new students who enrolled mid-year are already getting acclimated to the school.

“It’s amazing how quick it goes back to normal,” he said. “Everything has been very smooth here at Tayloe.”