LIVERMORE FALLS – Schools are nearly ready for opening day in SAD 36.

Though the doors don’t open to most students until Tuesday, teachers, administrators and custodians were all busy this week.

As soon as someone exited Superintendent Terry Despres’ office Tuesday, others were waiting to get in to see him.

The hallways at the high school have been brightened up with an array of colors.

Classroom doors are painted tangerine, fuchsia, lemon and an ocean teal.

Sixth-graders have moved back up to the middle school from the Cedar Street Complex.

Each grade will be located on different floors of the middle school this year. The sixth- graders will take the main floor, the seventh-graders are on the top floor and the eighth-graders on the bottom floor.

The four-year-old school program limited to 30 students has moved from the Livermore Elementary School to the Cedar Street Complex in Livermore Falls, where the Head Start programs are located. There is a waiting list for that program this year.

At the elementary school, all-day kindergarten is being offered for the first time to all students entering that grade level.

Materials for a new intensive reading program for grades one, two and three were being moved into classrooms Tuesday.

Literacy Coordinator Karen Hardy, a 20-year teacher, was working out lesson plans with first-grade teacher Penny Grant. Hardy is training as a literacy coordinator at the University of Maine in Orono and will be teaching literacy classes to Grant’s students.

A new lunch program is going into place this year in the system, with students having more choices for meals.

Penny Jackman, team leader for Regional Food Service, said elementary school students will have three or four options, including a “munch lunch” of side dishes, peanut butter and jelly, and two other choices such as turkey and gravy or ham.

At the middle school there will be fresh dough pizza daily and a main course plus two different types of Italian sandwiches.

The high school diner has a menu that includes a variety of options for breakfast and lunch. Students may pick among six entrees, such as chicken nuggets, pasta with meat sauce and pizza by the slice, then have two side dishes from nine options. Those sides include pasta salad, tossed salad, mashed potato and gravy and french fries.

Then there is Andie’s Deli, where cheeseburgers and chicken burgers, turkey Italians, fruit plates and other entrees are available.

As high school Principal Rod Wright was waiting to see the superintendent Tuesday, he said he was looking forward to an exciting year and getting students back into academics, athletics and extracurricular activities.