There is something new at New Haven High School. Something that gets cut in the lunch line, something poked and called “fresh meat” in the halls. This “thing” is a new freshman class.
When you are in a new school, anxiety is natural. You arrive with certain expectations, and when you actually get there, it is totally different. 50% of the freshman class said high school is what they expected. 33.3% of them said high school is not what they expected. 16.7% of them said maybe.
Freshman Hannah Rethemeyer said, “It is just the way people made it sound, like they said it is more fun than middle school, and it is.”
Another freshman, Madison Langenberg, said, “I expected the teachers to give out a lot more homework, and I expected that we would be rushed to get to class on time.”
For most freshmen, high school can either be terrifying or exciting. 25% of them said high school is terrifying and 75% of them said it is not. 91.7% of them said high school is exciting and 8.3% said it is not.
One freshman, Jacob Engelbrecht, said, “You have more freedom and it's a lot bigger.”
Freshman Payton Burkhardt said, “I like that high school has more activities to get closer with your grade.”
However, Caroline Otten said, “My least favorite thing about high school is having a short amount of time in lunch.”
The final question the freshman class was asked was, “If you could change one thing about high school, what would it be?” Most of the freshmen gave the predictable answers: not having a lot of homework, having study hall time for all classes, and so on and so forth. Likewise, Chloe Luekenhoff said, “One thing I would change is a bigger school, so it isn’t so crowded.”
As you can see from these responses, being a freshman is hard. At times, it seems you are nervous because you have never gone through high school, and in other moments, you are happy in high school. Being a freshman is the start of something new, so be prepared for a change.