WESTBROOK – Students showed up at Westbrook schools Wednesday morning by bus and car, on foot and on bikes, and many of them arrived smiling.

Wednesday morning marked the first day of school for students in the first through ninth grades in Westbrook.

“I still get goose bumps on the first day of school. It’s awesome,” said Superintendent Marc Gousse on Wednesday.

Groups of children and their parents lined many of the streets in Westbrook, waiting for the big yellow bus to pull up.

Abby Grover, 7, wearing a new purple dress she got for her first day of second grade, said her favorite part of summer was getting to go to Funtown/Splashtown, but she’s excited to start school to “meet new friends.”

Nearby, Isabella Welsch, also waiting for the bus to take her to Canal Elementary School for her first day in fourth grade, said she was excited because she’s in a new teacher’s class, but she was also sad to see summer go.

“It’s been pretty good. Summer was fun. I wish it was a little longer,” she said before getting on the bus.

Jaime Hanks said she also wished her summer with daughter Karina, 6, was a little longer.

“Summer’s been really good, it seemed to go by too quickly,” Hanks said. “She’s in first grade this year, so we’ve done this before. Last year it was really hard, but there’s almost a little happiness with this one. Last night was hard, but today she woke up excited.”

One of the biggest topics of conversation around the bus stop was the new back-to-school fashions, which included brightly colored sneakers, cartoon-character backpacks and special accessories like a One Direction charm.

Besides school shopping, parents had other traditions they’ve started to make the mornings easier on both themselves and their children, especially when trying to break the summer routine.

Elizabeth Richards knew it was time for her two boys, Jack, Grade 2, and Grant, Grade 4, to go back to school when they started fighting at the end of the summer.

“They went happily,” she said. “Last year it wasn’t that way. We do have a morning tradition when getting ready for school. We have a timer for everything. There’s a timer for waking up, getting ready, and if they do it fast enough, they have extra time to play at the end. It makes for no fights in the morning,” Richards said.

Anthony Hicks, 6, and his father, Andre Hicks, hang out together in the morning.

“We try to be goofy and try to make it fun for him,” said Laorie Hicks, Anthony’s mother.

A few students were so excited to be going back to class they arrived a day early, according to Cindy Button, the new transportation director for the district.

“I thought it went awesome and the drivers did a great job but there were a couple of kiddos that got mixed up. Only the ninth-graders went back today [Wednesday] and some of them kind of forgot that it was just the ninth grade. Other high-schoolers tried to get on [the buses]. Other than that, it was smooth sailing,” Button said.

One problem the district is facing is growing enrollments, especially at Saccarappa Elementary School, where projected kindergarten enrollment numbers were high enough to hire another teacher. The budget included money to hire that potential teacher, but the school is nearly out of space. The new teacher is using a space formerly reserved for an art and music classroom.

Gousse said the school is working on a solution, which could be using space in the cafeteria, bringing the music and art lessons into the classroom or re-examining what the school offers.

The first day of high school for the rest of the students started on Thursday, Aug. 29. Kindergartners will start on Sept. 3, after the four-day Labor Day weekend.

Kory Rolbiecki heads off to his first day of first grade in Westbrook Wednesday, all smiles as he leads a group of schoolmates to the bus.Anthony Hicks, 6, hugs his mother, Laorie Hicks, before running toward the bus on his first day of school in first grade at Saccarappa Elementary School.Nadia Ivanik waves goodbye to her son, Ilia, as he heads for the bus on his first day of fifth grade in Westbrook.A student races to catch the bus on Wednesday, the first day of the new school year in Westbrook.