Starting high school is supposed to be a rite of passage: a step closer to adulthood, a time to mature, and an opportunity to meet new people. It is a memorable scene in so many of those slightly cliché teen movies ingrained in our memories. So, starting high school virtually in 2020 was not what any freshman expected.
There was the inherent irony that for the first month of school, pajama day was every day. Instead of waiting for the bus to take us to school, we got an extra hour of sleep. The process of meeting our teachers and classmates was limited to turning our mics on to say hi in class or simply giving a thumbs up to the little boxes on our screens.
Those choosing to do hybrid learning transitioned in-person these past two weeks and felt like they were having a second first week of school. Although it was late-October, “how was your summer?” was a phrase constantly repeated on campus.
“This is the new normal,” said Natalie Delson (III), “I know we are missing out on something, but I don’t know what yet. It’s hard not being able to meet all the new people.” Delson is a new freshman this year, which brings on its own set of difficulties: “What is tending to happen now is that all the new kids are starting to clump together, instead of making friends with the people who have already been at Fieldston for a while. This starts to defeat the whole purpose of having new kids,” said Delson.
Echoing this sentiment, Talia Kohn (III) added “It’s disappointing knowing that we can’t have a normal freshman year. We will not have the same high school experience that the sophomores, juniors, and seniors… It’s hard to feel motivated online [when] all you want to do is go back to bed and sleep.” This struggle to develop “normal” habits and routines due to remote learning, coupled with the fact that many freshmen do not fully know their teachers, each other and the resources the school provides, makes for an extremely difficult transition to high school.
As a new student myself, the first couple of weeks of starting a new school virtually were very hard and stressful. However, as I transitioned into on-campus learning this week, I realized that Fieldston is very welcoming, and every day I feel less like a new student and more like a member of the community.
