Walking into high school as a new student, her eyes wander with nerves and curiosity. The final bell rings for the first period, and judgment crawls up her spine as she finds a seat. 

When Elizabeth Vue moved to Kings, she had a hard time branching out to other students. People were nice but not so welcoming. They would smile but not talk.

Vue’s shyness made it difficult and stressful to make friends because trying to fit in, find a group, or meet a friend for small talk during classes isn’t always the easiest.

“The road to 11th grade was tough. Freshman year I definitely had a hard time branching out and making friends. Sophomore year I branched out a little more and got out of my comfort zone. Finally junior year I now feel comfortable enough around people. I have a good amount of friends and I am happy where I am,” Vue said.

When Taylor Mills started at kings she felt left out of everything from school events to group projects. She only had friends because of sports, but not during the school day.

“I really felt alone my first semester. I had my volleyball team but only during volleyball. I had no friends during the school day. It might have been due to Covid, but I really hated half of my first year. I felt like I didn’t belong,” Mills said.

Mills noticed a lot of people feeding off rumors and drama, but she feels fortunate to have found her friend group who avoids all the talk and drama as much as possible.

Rachel Anderson, also faced the fear of judgment walking through new hallways with new faces.

“Having to start my life over, making new friends, adjusting to a new curriculum, finding a new soccer team, having to leave behind a life. I felt so stressed trying to make friends navigate the school, I was scared of people’s impressions of me and what they’d think of me,” Rachel Anderson said.

Due to Covid-19, Mrs. Murray changed the way she introduces new students and welcomes them on their first day of school.

“We used to do a new student lunch in and we got away from that because of Covid. What we do then is we tend to pair them up with a student to take them from class to class and lunch,” Murray said.

Andrew Eysodlt’s experience felt different. Kings provided a warm welcoming environment for him as a first-year student at Kings.

“Kings was much more welcoming than my old school. There was a very different atmosphere to Kings than Mason, probably because of the size. The biggest struggle was the change of structure from Mason to Kings because at Mason some days we would have five bells,” Eysoldt said. 

Murray finds a way for new students to be able to connect with other students by matching their interests or hobbies with already existing students at the school.

“Our kids are so willing to reach out to a new student, in fact I tend to try and target students who did come in as new students because they can pay it forward and help with pointers,” Murray said.