Lines of parents formed in the front hallway, which overflowed outside of St. Andrew Catholic School Monday afternoon, as they waited for the clock to strike noon, so they could walk into their child’s classroom to pick them up from their first day of school.

As of Friday, the student enrollment for St. Andrew Catholic School was already up by 37 students, which school officials said will increase even more due to additional interest and applications turned in on Monday.

Julie Dudek, who teaches middle school literature, math and religion, said the school reached its maximum amount of 35 students for 6th graders this year. She said the 7th and 8th grade levels each had 30 students on the first day of school.

She said Monday was a great first day of school.

Seventh grade student Julia Canzano began organizing her locker after school let out Monday afternoon to get ready for the rest of the school year. She said she is looking forward to participating in the extracurricular activities and sports this year.

“The first day went well as far as the first day could go,” she said.

Canzano said the students attended a prayer service Monday morning before receiving their lockers and going over basic procedures and routines of middle school.

Dudek said this is the second year a morning service was held for the middle school students. She said the service is a way to bring the entire middle school student body together before they are split into groups to learn more about each other.

Once the prayer service concluded, various activities were held for the students, along with discussions about the gospel reading, which highlighted the concept of seeds.

Dudek said that seeds represent the talents and goals the students want to accomplish, in addition to how they can be germinated to become fruitful and successful.

Sister Charlotte Gould, who teaches the 4-year-old voluntary pre-kindergarten class, said she had 16 children in class on Monday. Due to the popularity of the class, she said they added an additional pre-kindergarten class this year to accommodate more children.

The students sang “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star,” read the book and created a few crafts that included stars during the first day of school.

Gould said they took pictures of each child, so it could be placed inside of a frame they created with stars. The frames will be hung on a bulletin board in the classroom.

In addition, the students also received an introduction to how the work stations work, along with playing on the playground and learning how to wash their hands properly.

She said the kids were already telling her what stations they wanted to visit when they returned to school on Tuesday.

“Great day,” Gould said about the first day of school. “They all left happy … no tears.”

She said some of the pre-kindergarten students stay until noon, while others stay until 3 p.m. and 6 p.m.

In addition, St. Andrew Catholic School welcomed 11 children into its pre-kindergarten 3-year-old program, which was offered for the first time on Monday. The program is offered full-time from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m., morning only from 8 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., along with extended care from 3-6 p.m.

The students will have half days for the remainder of the week before starting their regular school schedule next week.