Incoming fifth grade Reed Intermediate School students, family members, and friends were welcomed at Dickinson Park on Monday, August 26.

The event was coordinated by the school’s Parent Teacher Association (PTA), and was held to offer the school’s newest students a chance to meet with friends while making some new ones. Families were asked to bring a picnic lunch to eat under the park’s pavilion, on a spread-out blanket, or elsewhere at the park.

The family picnic was scheduled to last until 1:30, when Reed Intermediate School was open for a walk-through for the fifth graders. It was also held the day before school began for the 2013-14 school year.

Reed PTA Co-President Lisa Wallace said the picnic offered students a chance to get together while decreasing possible anxiety they may have over attending a new school.

The picnic, she said, also offered students the chance to meet other students who will be in their cluster for the 2013-14 school year.

As one boy jogged across a patch of grass near the pavilion, he seemed to be checking on just that when he said to a friend, “Who’d you get for a teacher?”

Both Ms Wallace and Reed PTA Secretary Kristin Larson agreed that the picnic was a success.