In just a few days, Markari Blissett, 11, will walk through the doors of a school he’s never attended.
Precious Sims and Markari Blissett play a game of bumper pool at the Boys and Girls Club. They've had fun at the club this summer, but they are ready to go back to school.
He’ll leave behind afternoons of playing at the Boys and Girls club, trips to the Creative Discovery Museum and movie outings with his friends.
He’ll wake up early, spend his mornings hitting the books in his Dalton Middle School classrooms and spend his nights working on homework.
And he can’t wait to get started.
“It’s exciting because we get to have more freedom in middle school,” Markari said. “We get lockers, and we get to walk around by ourselves.”
But the size of the new school did prove a little daunting for the new sixth-grader.
“It’s big,” he said. “Once you turn a corner, there’s another corner and then there’s another corner and then you run into a bunch of windows.”
Markari’s friend, Precious Sims, agreed that the middle school would be big, but sometimes a larger school means more benefits, she said.
Precious is looking forward to trying out for sports teams, such as track and basketball, and meeting new people at DMS. Markari wants to do sports as well, and he said he might try out the glee club too so that he can go back to his old school — Blue Ridge Elementary — and perform.
Jordan Hernandez will be a freshman at Dalton High School this school year.
Jordan Hernandez, 15, will be a freshman at Dalton High School in just a few days. He’s already gotten his schedule in the mail, and he’s looking forward to joining the JROTC program at DHS.
He said he knows the transition may be challenging.
“There will be more work,” he said. “And it seems like it will be harder.
But for upcoming first grader Kaichelynn Massey, the excitement of school work takes a back seat to the excitement of getting prepared for the first day back. Kaichelynn is ready to go shopping.
- Kaichelynn Massey (left) and Edyth Sanabria are both ready for school to start back on August 10.
However, Kaichelynn realizes it isn’t all about new book bags, shoes and clothes. She’s looking forward to reading, seeing her friends again and meeting her new teacher at Brookwood Elementary School.
— MIMI ENSLEY, Dalton Public Schools Contributor
