BUTTE — It's only natural to experience nerves on the first day of school, but some Butte kids are getting the opportunity to calm their jitters with an orientation at East Middle School where they’re checking out all the new features of the old building that has recently been renovated.
"Me and my mom have been practicing going to basically my daily procedure and my mom’s giving me a little pep talk the last few days to make me feel a little more comfortable about, uh God, middle school," says Travis Whittington as he surveys the new school library on Aug. 17.
Tweleve-year-old Whittington is not alone in his trepidation as he joins the roughly 350 incoming seventh graders in navigating the building, meeting teachers, and mastering getting their lockers open.
"A lot of them come in with kind of nervous faces and it’s cool to see them walking out of here feeling a lot better," says Principal Keith Miller.
He stands in the hallway that is flooded with sounds and movement and offers advice to passing students. Principal Miller believes that one thing that helps set students at ease is the comfort of the newly renovated school that was completed within the last two years through a roughly $35 million school bond that added improvements to the building that opened in 1957.
"There’s not a spot in this building that didn’t get renovated, that didn’t get some love," says Miller.
The renovations include classrooms that are fit for a 21st-century learning environment with spacious science classrooms and interactive spaces for group learning, a new gymnasium and weight room as well as other improvements that most people don’t see.
"New heating system, new air cleaning systems, all that stuff that most people don’t see, you know fire suppression system, that most people don’t see but that make a pretty safe school," says Miller.
There are still a few more days of summer for Butte students, but the orientation really set the kids at ease—or at least it helped them learn how to open their lockers. But Travis Whittington is ready, sort of.
"I definitely feel a little less jittery now, now knowing how it’s going to be, yeah."
