By Lori Lyons

Contributing Writer

LAPLACE – When Sylvia Bailey became the first-time principal of Lake Pontchartrain Elementary School in LaPlace this year, she knew it would be a challenge.

She just didn’t know how much of a challenge it would turn out to be.

Just days after St. John the Baptist Parish schools opened in August, Hurricane Isaac struck the Louisiana coast. The slow-moving category one storm brought torrential rains and sent a huge tidal surge from the lake into much of the parish. Thousands of homes were flooded – including Bailey’s in the Cambridge subdivision. And several schools sustained millions of dollars’ worth of damage – including Bailey’s.

“I lost both my homes,” she said.

In the months since, Bailey has faced innumerable challenges, not only as a resident trying to rebuild but also as the principal of a school without a building and with a student body that has been scattered to the winds. As Lake Pontchartrain Elementary remains closed while school officials try to determine its fate, its nearly 700 students have been divided among six different schools throughout the parish. And through it all, Bailey has struggled to remain the principal of the school she loves.

“I try not to show my own frustration,” said Bailey, whose home took on three feet of water.  “I feel like, if I spend too much time on school matters, then my own house suffers. But if I spend too much time dealing with my house and my family, then the school suffers. It’s very hard.”

With most of the students established at the Adult Education Center in Garyville, that’s where Bailey has built herself a base camp.

“I have an office there,” she said. “But there’s not much room. I have to share.”

The rest of the students are spread across the area. The pre-kindergarten students are being taught at the St. John Child Development Center in Garyville. The kindergarteners are being taught at East St. John Elementary. The first- and second-graders are at Garyville/Mt. Airy Magnet School. The third- and fourth-graders are at Fifth Ward Elementary. The fifth-graders are at LaPlace Elementary and the sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders are at the Adult Education Center.

The students are kept in their original classes, with their original teachers and are generally kept separate from the other schools’ populations.

“They have their own lunch and their own recess,” Bailey said. “For a while they were kept apart from the other student bodies, but that’s beginning to change a little.”

Bailey said she and her assistants spend several hours a day traveling from school to school, checking on the students and their teachers, making sure they have everything they need to teach, while also dealing with concerned and stressed-out parents, many of whom also lost their homes and are commuting from outside the area.

“We still are held accountable,” Bailey said. “We’ve got to make sure we’re doing everything we’re supposed to be doing to give these children the best education possible. We left everything behind. What we have is what we have been given. It’s nowhere near what we had before. The teachers are just doing the best they can with what they have.”

So is Bailey.

After fleeing her home in waist deep water, Bailey, her husband, her 22-year-old daughter and 12-year old son spent three weeks living at another daughter’s apartment in Baton Rouge. Eventually the commute became too much and Bailey was able to locate a rental house in Lutcher. Now she, like thousands of other residents, is fighting with insurance adjusters to get her home repaired.

Likewise, school officials are meeting with insurance adjusters and officials from FEMA and weighing whether or not to repair the damage, estimated to be in the millions, or to tear it down and start from scratch.

“I think it can be saved,” Bailey said. “That’s not the opinion of everyone.”

Bailey said if the school is repaired, she and her staff – 100 percent of which has been retained – will be able to return home to Lake Pontchartrain Elementary and pick up where they left off in August. But if they school is slated for a rebuild, which would take two to three years, she and her staff are likely to be displaced. Again.

“We just want our school back,” Bailey said. “That’s my biggest goal.”