Monday's solar eclipse inspired awe, not injury, at two Little Rock schools where students watched the celestial event.
A partial solar eclipse touched all corners of Arkansas and the entire North American continent as a total eclipse descended a small piece of the continental U.S. In Little Rock, around 89 percent of the sun was obscured by the moon for a few minutes around 1:20 p.m.
Julie Hathcote, a fifth-grade teacher at Pulaski Academy, said her middle school’s roughly 415 students, minus those who were absent, trekked outside to watch the eclipse. Students had studied the scientific phenomena the previous week.
Some of her fifth-graders were a little “apprehensive” about the possible dangers of the sun, Hathcote said. Grade levels swapped a limited number of glasses around during peak coverage, a process that was “a little chaotic,” she said.
Still, when the children tilted their heads up, their mouths hung open. You could picture a little cartoon speech bubble with the word “Wow” coming out of their lips, Hathcote said.
After the moon fully passed in front of the sun, some students were let down by the lack of darkness, she said. But many showed joy and “pure excitement” on their faces, Hathcothe said. And she’d never seen an eclipse, either.
“I feel like my reaction was very similar to the children’s,” she said.
In downtown Little Rock at the eStem Public Charter elementary and junior high schools, another cohort of kids gazed skyward Monday afternoon.
Elementary school students gathered on the playground, said Jess Dickson, the public charter’s activities coordinator. Some junior high school students went to the Museum of Discovery while others were atop a nearby parking deck.
To view the eclipse, students had to submit a signed permission slip, and safety tips were also taught in class, Dickson said. When the time came, she said, students shouted a countdown that crescendoed into a “Woo!”
The children seemed excited with what they saw, Dickson said, though some expressed more excitement for 2024. That's the year an eclipse will return to Arkansas, but this time, in totality.
Neither Pulaski Academy or eStem reported any injuries. Some central Arkansas schools, including the Little Rock School District, opted for children to view the eclipse indoors via live-stream video out of safety precautions and fear of faulty glasses.
No eclipse-linked issues were reported to the Little Rock Police Department or the Little Rock Fire Department, either, according to spokesmen from each agency.
And three Little Rock optometry clinics surveyed Tuesday morning they hadn’t received any calls for people seeking appointments due to eclipse-induced eye damage.
One clinic, Little Rock Family Eye Care, received a call from someone experiencing blurred vision. The prospective patient had worn protective eclipse eyewear, the receptionist said, but it had fallen off.
Read Wednesday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.