The first day of school is always tough on everyone: new kids, the returning students, and the teachers. This year the school decided to make freshman orientation and the returning classes first day, the same day. Normally those two days are separated – the freshman have their day to get to know the school, and the returning classes have their day to start altogether. Even though having both on the same day saved us from having an additional day of school at the end of the year, I don’t think it wasn’t the greatest idea.
This without a doubt made it even harder on everyone to be back. Confused freshmen were bumping into upperclassmen that were running to find friends or look for a new class. The result: complete chaos. Although the sophomores, juniors, and seniors only had a half day, it definitely felt like a full day due to the number of things going on at once.
Bruno Klaus, a freshman at Stamford High, said, “It’s already hard enough seeing the school and all your classes for the first time ever. Having your first day of high school be joined with the first day of upperclassmen makes it even worse.” Another person that also said he’d rather have it the other way was administrator Matt Forker. “I prefer it to be separate,” Forker said. “To have freshman come in for a half day and everyone start the next day. It wasn’t completely bad, and we didn’t choose for it to be like this, the school district did. If next year they choose to continue to have it like this we will definitely be better prepared.”
So even though the intentions were good, I believe it would be wise for us to go back to separating the two days to spare the sanity of all the students.