3 1/2 Years At Oak Hill High School

My high school experience was very different compared to most of us in the class of 2020.  I came in freshman year to a completely new school.  Making things even harder it was halfway through the school year.  Although even though I was a new kid to the class, the teachers and the students made Oak Hill feel like a second home for me.  These few years here have given me so many unforgettable memories and good times but switching was the best choice I ever made.  I know everyone in the class in one way or another and have made so many friendships with many people.  

  It was the start of the second semester of my Freshman year and I was extremely nervous for my first day at a new school.  I had never transferred schools before, I did not know what to expect, but I had high hopes that it would be better than my last school.  What I noticed very quickly is that everyone was so friendly and willing to help,  there were no cliques of kids that only hung out with each other. Everyone seemed to hang out with everyone.  All of the teachers were also very friendly and willing to help which made everything so much easier.  For example on my first day Mrs. Rose introduced me to sit with a bunch of people from our class for lunch so that I wouldn’t have to eat alone.  We all experienced our first Spring Fling, our class had what seemed like a lot of spirit, but we were freshmen so due to our lack of experience we ended up coming in last.  Although we all had fun and that’s really all that mattered.  We all went to the first Spring Fling dance which mostly consisted of us awkwardly dancing towards the edges of the room.  The end of the year came up quickly after that and mostly consisted of everyone trying to catch up on work and hours of Membean that we had pushed off till the last minute.  We were all so ready to move on to the next year. We all ended freshman year with so many experiences, new friendships and so many memories that we will always remember.  

We started Sophomore year excited to finally not be the freshman of the school.  We had more knowledge about high school now making things easier.  We tried to keep up with our Membean but that only lasted so long until the minutes began piling up again.  Homecoming came around which for our class was the second one but for me this was the first homecoming that I had been a part of.  Our spirit continued to grow over freshman year and when it came time for the dance we were all a little less awkward.  The work this year seemed to be more intense but we all kept up with it.  The end of the first semester came up faster than we were all expecting and just like that we had finished the first semester of our sophomore year.  Soon after this we all started to get our licenses, which was crazy to think that we were out driving on the roads alone.  We started to get to drive to school and see each other on the way there,  which was an odd sight at first seeing each other driving.  This was also the year where we had the problem with the wells at the school.  So for a month we were only going to school for about half of the day.  We all were very excited to finally have some time off from all of the work that we were being assigned.  Most of us used these half days to hang out with friends and sometimes catch up on past due work.  After things with the water started to go back to normal Spring Fling came around and we got last again.  Soon after that the end of our sophomore year had begun which we all scrambled to get our work done.  But it felt like as soon as the year began it was over and some of us started to realize how fast high school was going. 

Fast forward to Junior year we were all finally upperclassmen.  This was the year that everyone had warned us about.  We had to take the SAT this year.  Most of us were nervous about this because everyone had always made the SAT seem like it was such a big deal.  Although another year of school was interrupted by a windstorm in the fall.  This had set us back a whole week until the school had power again.  The first semester went by super quickly and before we knew it the SAT was a week away.  We were all very stressed but after we took it most of us realized we had nothing to worry about.  The end of the year came quickly after the SAT.  That’s when most of us realized that we were about to be seniors.  This was crazy to all of us because it felt not very long ago we were naive freshmen about to go through our first year of school.  Time had flown by so fast with so many great experiences and our junior year was finished.  

Finally Senior year, it felt surreal that we had all made it this far, time has flown by and we are all now seniors.  We finally won our first homecoming this year! It was our last chance and we finally did it.  Senior year has been so much fun and I think we all really enjoyed it. The work wasn’t too difficult and we all just focused on having a good time with our friends and classmates.  The first semester went by faster than any of us had prepared for and before we knew it we were applying to colleges and receiving back letters of whether we had gotten in or not, some of us even started committing to certain schools.  Then about half way into our second semester we started hearing things about something called Coronavirus that was breaking out in China.  None of us thought too much about it.  Then it spread to Europe which is when some of us began to be concerned that it was going to spread to the U.S. which I even remember having conversations with some of the teachers about it.  Faster than we thought it started spreading into the U.S., then one by one schools and states started to close down across the country.  We were all very worried that Maine would do the same.  We left school on a Friday in march and that Sunday we were all notified that we would be not returning for two weeks.  Two weeks turned into a month and then a month turned into the end of the school year.  Just like that our senior year had ended and none of us had even said our goodbyes.  No one was ready for this but we are all making the best of the situation we have.  It wasn’t the end to a senior year that we always expected but all that matters is that we made it this far together.  

Oak Hill High School has given me some of the best memories in my life.  Although it’s not just Oak Hill,  it’s my fellow classmates that made it all worth it.  You guys are the best and I’m glad that we all made it to graduation together.  Thank you to everyone who has helped me through these three and a half years together.  I know we are all going to do great things with our lives and I can’t wait to see what the future holds for everyone.  

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