Children who escaped the Connecticut massacre are returning to classes today in a refurbished school named after their old one.

Students returned to school in the shattered Connecticut town of Newtown for the first time since a gunman’s rampage killed 26 people in an elementary school, altering the gun control debate in Washington and forcing a retailer to pull guns from shelves.

The head of the Connecticut primary school devastated by a shooting rampage was among the victims, an official said today.