The smallest of kids at South Shore Fine Arts Academy stepped outside into the sun after school on Monday and were confused by the commotion.
Children were yelling. Parents and staff were pointing up at the school’s roof. Students stopped in their tracks, turned around and saw the visitor.
Some wondered if the person dressed in all red was Santa Claus. Pretty quickly, word spread that it was the Elf on the Shelf.
“Somebody take a picture!” a little girl yelled.
A young boy asked: “How did she get on the roof?”
Principal Vicki Brown, donning a red costume, hat and shoes, stood atop the school holding a clipboard with a sign that read “I’m making a list and checking it twice.”
“Our principal having this creative idea to do it for the students, it’s just phenomenal,” said Tangela Echols, a special education classroom assistant, who called the kids’ reactions “priceless.”
“She always engages. Anything we have in the school, she participates,” Echols said of the principal.
Brown said she dressed up as Elf on the Shelf to keep students interested in coming to class the final week before winter break.
“It’s awesome to be able to give our students a ‘remember when’ moment,” Brown said. “I could hear them say, ‘Wow! Is she Santa? And then I could hear the kids say ‘No, she’s Elf on the Shelf! And so it was just a great feeling.”
Students at South Shore Fine Arts Academy on Monday see their principal perched on the roof.
Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times
It was windy on the roof. But Brown did her best to stay still while she looked down on the kids to decide who was being naughty or nice — such a good job, in fact, that some kids didn’t realize she was a real person at first.
“She isn’t moving, I love it,” a teacher shouted while filming a video on her cellphone.
The plan didn’t go off without a hitch, though. Brown ordered a costume that didn’t come in time, so she made hers at the last minute.
“We’re a fine arts school, so it’s a great way to show students that we can be creative,” she said.
The elf is expected to make appearances at the school the rest of the week. Tuesday she sat atop a milk cooler in the cafeteria to monitor whether students behaved at lunch. Her observations throughout the week will feed into this year’s naughty and nice list.
Christopher Strong, whose son is in 4th grade at South Shore, said he was “shocked” to see the principal on the roof when he arrived for after-school pickup.
“I love this school; they’re always doing different things,” Strong said. “It makes them want to come. My son is up before me, excited for school.”
Not all the kids were tricked by the elf’s appearance, though.
A teacher asked a student if they knew who was on the roof, looking for the answer “Elf on the Shelf.”
“I do know who that is,” the girl responded. “It’s Ms. Brown.”
At South Shore Fine Arts Academy on Monday, student wondered how their principal, Vicki Brown, got onto the roof. The administrator, dressed as Elf on the Shelf, went up high to keep students excited about school during the week before winter break.
Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times