Excitement, uncertainty, and a dash of anxiety filled the air this morning as the Freshmen entered the school for the first time as official Chargers. While witnessing the controlled chaos of the 490 freshmen on their first day, it was quite a comforting experience, as if feels that school is nearly back to normal. Although we can still feel the shadows of the pandemic, this morning’s Freshmen Orientation was a nice return to normalcy for everyone. 

As in past years, the day started out with the Freshmen being led down to the soccer field to have their Class of 2025 picture taken. After that, the Freshmen piled into the gym and filled the bleachers to witness the Welcome Assembly. During this assembly the counseling team, Mr. Broer, the administration team, Mr. Daniels, Alliance, and the Freshmen’s own student body representatives were introduced. Also during this assembly, the Freshmen were able to witness three incredible performances from our cheer and pom teams. Watching this assembly, I couldn’t help but feel a great deal of pride; proud to be a part of Chatfield and proud to welcome this new generation of Chargers into our school, our family.

After the assembly ended, the Freshmen were then split into different groups based on their Access class and were then led by a member of Alliance to different stations. At these stations, the Freshmen met their counselors, took a tour of the school, got their school ID photos taken, received their Chromebooks, and listened to Mr. Thanos’ introductory speech about Chatfield. As the day unfolded, I kept thinking back to my Freshmen Orientation experience and how scared and nervous I was, but now being a Junior and watching the current Freshmen walk through their first day of school, I realized just how amazing the Chatfield staff is at making everyone feel comfortable and welcomed. I also want to give a huge shout-out to all of the members of Alliance, who excelled throughout the day by being incredible leaders. 

For the last part of the day, much like Back-to-School Night, the Freshmen walked through their schedule and received a ten-minute introduction to a variety of different aspects of high school in each class such as work habits, content grades, and expectations.

The tradition of Freshmen Orientation marks not only the start of Freshmen high school careers, but also hopefully the beginning of a more normal school year. Even with the mask mandate being reinstated within Jeffco school just last night, the smooth continuation of Freshmen Orientation shows that with just a little flexibility, we can made this new school year as normal as possible.

Gallery • 11 Photos