The first day marked the beginning of the future for the district, and both nervousness and excitement lingered in the air.
Sophomore Cooper Chello expressed both these emotions last Thursday.
“I think everybody was nervous for sure, including me, but other than that I think it went pretty well,” Chello said. “I think what I’m most looking forward to is what they decide as events and traditions.”
It wasn’t only the students who observed how chaotic the first day was. So too did English teacher Megan Thonsgaard.
“No one knew where their classes were and even teachers sometimes don’t know where everything is, so I know a lot of people felt overwhelmed,” Thonsgaard said. “But I know once we get these routines down and people know where things are, everything’s going to be great.”
U.S. history teacher Crystal Krueger expressed hopes that the students coming into the new schools would respect the state-of-the-art facilities that the new school has.
“Everything is so nice and state of the art, and I hope all the new students appreciate it and respect it,” Krueger said. “And after the first day I went into the restrooms and there was no graffiti and no trash on the floor, so that was nice.”
For a couple hundred seniors, the day started out at the turf football field with Senior Sunrise. Despite the chaotic nature of the first day, Thonsgaard expressed excitement over the fresh start that the new school brings with it.
“Everything’s new, whatever happened in the past for me as a teacher and for students, it’s all new,” Thonsgaard said. “We have all sorts of exciting opportunities in front of us, some that we don’t even know about yet, and I look forward to seeing those things unfold.”
Months of hard work and preparations went into the opening day, and no one would know better of the work that went into preparing the schools than Memorial principal Laurie Kinne. She and Legacy principal Dr. Cody Blair spent lots of time last year getting ready for this moment.
“We had to conduct a lot of interviews, pick out lots of furniture, go to lots of meetings to see what we needed in the classrooms, talk about curriculum and instruction and dual credit,” Kinne said. “And it’s still a work in progress, and it will be throughout the year. Just like today, we’re still tweaking the parking situation and transportation and all of those things.”
Lunch and parking were the major issues that popped up during the opening day.
“Lunch was too crowded, especially the first lunch, so we have moved more tables into the lunch area today to allow for more seating,” Kinne said. “We have to have enough seating for kids, so we’re still working on that. Drop off and pick up and those sorts of things. Leveling classes, typical first-day-of-school things, nothing major.”
While the size of the school at first made it confusing to transverse, Chello also sees it as a positive.
“I think my favorite thing was the accessibility,” Chello said. “While it can also be a downside because it’s a lot harder to find your classes, there’s a bunch of stairwells to go up and different routes to get to class. That way you can avoid the main traffic around the learning stairs.”
While some are sad to leave behind their old friends and peers, the new schools bring opportunities to make new ones.
“I miss my old friends and team, but I’m looking forward to working with my new team and making relationships not just with kids but also the rest of my department.” Krueger said.
