When Jamie Brock taught at Signal Mountain Middle School last year, she did so from a cart.

With no classroom to call her own, the nomadic enrichment teacher wheeled her supplies from room to room.

But on Monday, Mrs. Brock traded her four wheels for four walls as she began moving into her brand-new classroom at Signal Mountain Middle-High School.

By noon, Mrs. Brock; her husband, David; and daughter, Sarah Kate, transformed the space into an explosion of color. Rainbow-colored alphabet magnets covered the whiteboards, markers sat in clear red and yellow plastic boxes and a fuzzy blue polka-dot rug marked the front of the classroom.

“I didn’t have a classroom last year, so I’m making up for it now,” Mrs. Brock said. “The fact that I came from the cart makes me more excited.”

Throughout the new middle-high school, which is still partially under construction, anxious teachers stepped into their classrooms, some for the first time. Although many toured the building earlier in the construction phase, principal Eddie Gravitte gave teachers the green light on Monday to start unpacking their classrooms for the first time.

High school band director Robert Groves put some of his students to work Monday morning unloading snare drums and cymbals in preparation for next week’s band camp. This is Mr. Groves’ first year teaching in Hamilton County, so he said he can relate to some of his new high school students.

“They’re excited, nervous — same as me,” he said.

Some members of the Signal Mountain community never thought the 264,250-square-foot, $39.8 million school would become a reality, teachers said. Eighth-grade science teacher Carolyn Whitley said she remembers meeting about the school in the 1970s.

As she took stock of her science lab Monday, which is twice as big as her old classroom at Signal Mountain Middle, Ms. Whitley nearly had to pinch herself. Her storage closet is so large, she joked about setting up an efficiency apartment inside and just “popping out for classes.”

“I have never opened a new school,” she said. “We’re beyond excited.”

Students will start trickling in next week to pick up their class schedules, and registration is Aug. 6. The first full day of school is Aug. 12.

Despite hallways filled with unopened cardboard boxes, blank white walls and dusty floors, Ms. Whitley said she had no doubt the school would be ready in time.

“Oh, teachers could pull this together in two days,” she said.

Separated from the middle school by a large dining hall, the high school is not as far along as the lower grades.

Exceptional education teacher Brandi Buntain said she tried to work in her classroom Monday, but workers were painting the doorjambs, so she did what she could.

“I brought in a college refrigerator, a coffee pot and my books,” she said. “I’m sure everything is going to fall into place.”

Teachers especially were excited finally to have permission to enter the building because their move-in date changed three times, Ms. Buntain said.

“Everybody’s pretty pumped about it,” she said.

Ms. Buntain joked that administrators should provide maps of the facility before she comes back later this week to finish setting up her classroom.

“I’ve already been lost four times,” she said.

After a curriculum meeting with other sixth-grade teachers, Mrs. Brock came back to her classroom and found herself somewhat overwhelmed with the work that remained. Unsure of where exactly to begin, she went to her magnetic whiteboard and began arranging letters.

“W-E-L-C-O-M-E.”

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