This year’s freshman class was the first to come from the new Dean Rusk Middle School building. They transitioned to Sequoyah, which was built over twenty years ago.

One of the advantages of Dean Rusk is that the building is brand new. The incoming freshmen are now having to go from clean cut to slightly used. Freshmen Madilyn Fessenden and Ashera Ly both agree that coming to Sequoyah was a change from Dean Rusk.

“I feel like coming to Sequoyah was kind of a downgrade because the lockers are your size here compared to Dean Rusk,” Fessenden said. “It’s just kind of old, and the middle school was brand new.”

The transition from middle school to high school is a big adjustment for the incoming freshmen, but Ly’s thoughts changed after the first few weeks here. After coming from the new Dean Rusk building, older Sequoyah paled in comparison to it.

“It was not as bad coming here as I expected, but in my opinion, Sequoyah is just old,” Ly said. “And the bathrooms were way cleaner at Dean Rusk than they are here.”

Dean Rusk offered not only a new building for students but also many technology tools for the students to utilize. Each student at the middle school received a personal laptop to use for their classwork and homework.

“The computers helped me in so many ways. We did not need any binders, so it was easy to stay organized,” Fessenden said. “I am just very disorganized all the time, so I lose a lot of stuff now since I don’t have the laptops here at Sequoyah.”

The personal laptops provided a more organized way to work, but they also helped many students who may not have had the luxury of technology at home.

“There are some people who do not have as much access to technology at home, so it was nice having the laptops,” Ly said. “It was cool because you could not only get a lot done at school, but you could also take that laptop home and use it there too.”

Not having the same technological assets is also an adjustment freshman Grant Davis is having to make. The loss of laptops coming into freshman year has added to the list of changes the incoming freshmen are having to make as they enter high school.

“Not having the laptops is making it more difficult to learn,” Davis said. “It is just harder to learn because you do not have as many resources readily available to you like you did with having the laptops all the time.”

Even though Sequoyah is not as up to date as Dean Rusk, Ly believes it does still bring a certain atmosphere that was not present at the middle school.

“I love when you walk into Sequoyah you just get a ton of spirit thrown at you,” Ly said. “At Dean Rusk, the building is just empty, and the walls were so bare. Here there is stuff hanging up everywhere supporting the school which I think is really cool.”