Students, staff and parents of Franklin Park School gathered on the campus September 4 for a festival to welcome in the new school year.

School officially starts for most students on September 5, but there were a number of students who seemed to be ready to return a day earlier.

Representatives from a number of township-based organizations were on hand. The Franklin Township Police Community Policing Bureau, the Franklin Food Bank and the Franklin Township Youth Center were just a few of the organizations who staffed tables and provided information to all who asked.

There were also a number of local businesses on hand to talk about their offerings.

“We just thought it would be a great opportunity to get our community, including our families, our students, and our community partners to be able to welcome everyone back for the school year,” said school Principal Jen Stein.

The theme of the day, Stein said, was unity.

“We thrive in unity and essentially it’s the fact that we spent a lot of time last year really focusing on diversity and inclusivity and embracing every single representation within this school while also educating them on the bigger aspect,” she said. “We believe that there’s children of many abilities, so the more that we can tap into our resources, the more that we can educate our students, the more empathetic, the more connected they are to everyone that we consider to be a family here at our school.”

“I’m overall excited to see everyone on here today,” she said.

Montese Anderson, president of the Franklin Park PTO, said she was “just really excited, so this school year is gonna be amazing. Mrs. Stein has done a really excellent job.”

“We are looking forward to thriving at the Hive this year,” Stein said. “And this is just the beginning of what this year is going to be.”

“It definitely is,” Anderson said. “We really encourage any business owner, community members to just be involved. If they want to attend something, reach out to the PTO. We’re here to open the space up for you to have a different group of people to touch, but also provide resources to the parents. So definitely be involved.”

Following are some scenes from the day: