It has been over a month since our 2023-2024 school year started, and it is noticeable that the start of this year has been very different compared to the start of last year. There have been fewer incidents and more cooperation between students. “The freshmen aren’t as chaotic as we were in the beginning which is good,” said Kai Johnson, a sophomore. “I’ve noticed that there are a lot fewer fights,” said freshman Matt Dalmas. The freshmen of this year have acted more calm in these first few weeks when compared to the freshmen at the start of last year. So that begs the question, why?

One possible explanation is that the freshmen act calmer because the fact that they have more liberties and responsibilities compared to their days in middle school. “There’s little to no fights, we can have our phones, well, sometimes. There’s weapon detectors and stuff, people are chill,” said Cale Long, a freshman. “I think it’s because we didn’t have any of these last year,” said Long.

Another theory to the behavior from last year is the intimidating task of going from a small middle school to a big high school. “You go from being a big fish in a small pond to a small fish in a big pond,” said Mr. Elias NeJame, a teacher. The change is felt not only socially, but physically, too. “The school was a lot bigger which was scary at first,” said Johnson.

However, the biggest factor in the difference between these two freshman classes (last year’s and this year’s) is how the pandemic affected each group of students. In early 2020, our school years were cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic. The year after that, we entered the digital world of virtual learning. Virtual learning was a very difficult time for everyone, so you can imagine how hard it was for teenagers.

“Virtual learning was rather stressful and a new experience. Not being in the building and not having the ability to talk to friends makes people restless. They wanted to be able to go and do things, but they were confined to their computers. A lot of people didn’t know what they were doing,” said Johnson.

Virtual learning terribly affected not only students’ academic efforts but also their mental health. “A lot of people didn’t have access to support since they were home all the time. That made people frustrated and annoyed, and because of that, once they got back to school, they released their anger. Plus, there were “new” rules and regulations that they had to conform to,” said Johnson.

Because virtual learning was not in person, it was difficult to enforce rules upon the students. With the shift back to in-person learning, rules began to be enforced again, and new students were caught off guard by them.  “7th grade is already a hard year, physically and emotionally, and because it was online, they didn’t get a proper learning experience. Their 8th-grade year had no consequences because the staff was still adjusting to real life,” said NeJame.

It wasn’t until last year that things began to shift. The behavior noticeably changed, and the students calmed. “By the end of last year, there was a shift. But, still, how do you make up for time lost? Some kids are still struggling from the aftershocks of the COVID-19 pandemic, with depression and anxiety,” said NeJame.

Over three years have passed since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, and most think that everything involved in it has ended. But the truth is, the effects are still resonating with our students. Although, as time has passed, things have been slowly turning back to normal. But there’s no saying how long that will take.