DALLAS (KRLD) - Organizers say more than 10,000 students were expected to receive supplies during the annual "Mayor's Back to School Fair" in Dallas. This year's event at Fair Park was split into two days to ensure capacity restrictions would be met.
People who rely on mass transit were able to pick up supplies Thursday. Parents with cars could come Friday.
No hair cuts or check-ups were given. Families stayed in their cars, and volunteers loaded a backpack and school supplies into the back seat, trunk or pick-up truck bed.
Some families started lining up at the gate to Fair Park before 6 a.m. The fair started at 9 a.m.
"It's very strange, we've always been taught to communicate in person," one girl said while she waited with her mother. "This year, not being able to thank them as much as we could in person, it's very difficult."
She is entering her sophomore year and says people's response to the pandemic has made her interested in studying psychology in college.
"We've always been surrounded by people, greeting people with handshakes, hugs, very touch," she says. "With this virus, it's very different."
Mayor Eric Johnson greeted some families, along with Champ, the Dallas Mavericks' mascot, as they waited in their cars.
"The city of Dallas has historically and will continue to rise to challenges like this. We've never faced the coronavirus before, but we've faced other challenges before," Johnson says. "We always rally around each other, and we always come together. We take care of our people. That's what we're doing now, and I have no doubt the next challenge that comes along, and there will be another challenge after coronavirus, we'll meet that challenge, too."
Johnson says families may have trouble adjusting to online learning and struggling with not knowing what the school year might look like in October or November. But he says the generation in school now is learning how to adjust and solve problems.
"How they cope with that uncertainty, how they deal with all this change and all the adversity could make them mentally stronger," Johnson says. "That would be a great thing if that was a positive that came out of all this."
Dallas ISD says classes will take place online only for at least the first four weeks of the school year, which starts the day after Labor Day. Superintendent Michael Hinojosa says the school board will revisit the plan in September and decide month-to-month whether to begin in-person classes.