Los Cerritos Welcomes 6th-Graders : Education: Younger students join Thousand Oaks intermediate school for the first time. Many Simi campuses still rebuilding after quake.

As students scrambled to find their lockers, pick up their ID cards, make last-minute changes in their schedules, and find their long-lost friends, a common question rang out on the grounds of Los Cerritos Intermediate School on Wednesday.

“Do you know where the sixth-graders go?”

The youngest of the school’s new students queried anyone who established eye contact as they tried to find their way around the unfamiliar campus.

The Conejo Valley Unified school was one of those making major changes--by adding sixth-graders--as 75,000 Ventura County students from Ojai to Moorpark headed back to school Wednesday. Most schools in Ventura and Oxnard started classes on Tuesday.

Jeremy Pollinger, 11, a sixth-grader who exercised the option of attending Thousand Oaks’ Los Cerritos rather than staying in elementary school, looked forward to the new experience. “I like the idea of switching classes. I heard it’s a lot more fun, and P.E. is every day,” Jeremy said.

“There’s a lot more people, though. That’s kind of scary,” he said, gesturing at the hundreds of teen-agers milling about in the back of the school waiting for the homeroom bell.

Calmer and cooler was Lauren Quick, 13, toting a backpack decorated with her colorful collection of Band-Aids with cartoon characters and a trendy metal lunch box.

“It’s annoying,” Lauren said of the new sixth-graders at the school as her eighth-grade friends nodded in agreement. “My sister is in sixth grade. She forgot her lunch, and I had to bring it to her.”

Still, Lauren said she remembered her first day at the school, and would show her younger sister around the campus, which has increased from 670 to 880 students this year.

In the Simi Valley Unified School District, students returned to continued construction on their quake-damaged campuses. The district, which saw a decline in enrollment last year as numerous families moved out of damaged homes, expects numbers to return to normal this year.

And Simi Valley High School students, who have had to use Royal High School’s gym since the earthquake, will see a new and improved gymnasium open in November.

“We can finally have pep rallies, dances and basketball games on our own turf,” said senior Jennifer Levy, 17, as she participated in opening-day lunch antics, which included dancing to some hip-hop tunes in the quad and a water-balloon toss.

Principal Kathryn Scroggin said opening day went smoothly, except for one too few Spanish teachers and a missing bell system. She said the school has hired a temporary substitute, but needs to hire a full-time teacher to meet the demand for Spanish I and II this year. And the bell system, which was disconnected during earthquake repair work, was replaced by shouting teachers who had to corral the students to their after-lunch classes.

Behind the scenes at the district’s two high schools, administrators are planning for restructuring in the 1996-97 school year. Next year, the high schools, which now teach grades 10-12, will open their doors to ninth-graders. The restructuring also includes converting Sequoia Junior High School into a third high school--a technology and performing arts magnet school that would serve the entire district.

“We have a lot of committees working on a lot of details--from new boundaries to staffing and curriculum--so we will be ready to go next year,” district Deputy Director Susan Parks said.

In the Conejo Valley Unified School District, Thousand Oaks High School students opened the day with a new dress code that bans gang attire and bare midriffs.

Although many students grumbled about the code when it was approved last spring, few said it made a difference in how they dressed.

Jim Parkinson, 16, a junior, said he heard a guidance counselor ask one student to pull up his baggy pants. But Robb McCallum, 16, said the restrictions would do little to combat gangs. “No matter what the dress code, if they’re trying to stop gang activity, gangs will change what they wear.”

Times correspondent David R. Baker contributed to this story.