It's safe to say that Veronica Alves, a fifth-grader at Downes Elementary, is looking forward to her upcoming transition to middle school.
“I'm just so excited to get out of here,” she said. “I love this school, but I need somewhere new.”
Alves is headed to the Middle School Honors Academy at Christiana High School, a school she chose to apply for after hearing representatives speak at an assembly. She later toured the school.
“When I visited the school, I was like, oh my god, this is such a nice school,” she added. “From the moment I got there, I felt I belong here.”
Alves is looking forward to meeting new people and taking more world language classes. She's learning Chinese at Downes, and also speaks a little Russian and Japanese and is exposed to Portuguese and Polish at home. She now wants to take Spanish, like many of her friends do.
“I really want to travel the world when I grow up, and language is the key to do that,” said Alves, who wants to be a marine biologist or a figure skating coach when she grows up.
While Alves is certainly excited about middle school, that's not always the case for students faced with leaving the elementary schools they've grown accustomed to, said Teresa Reed, an instructional coach at Downes.
With that in mind, Downes organized an event Wednesday that allowed outgoing fifth-graders and their parents to meet representatives of their middle schools. The students gathered in the cafeteria for an assembly and later visited booths set up by several schools, where they could ask questions about classes, extra-curricular activities, uniforms and other things they were curious about.
“Some of our students were expressing concern about making the transition and not knowing any of the staff,” Reed said. “A lot of them have been here for a number of years, so we were thinking it would be a good opportunity for them to connect with the staff at their new school.”
The event, which Reed hopes becomes an annual occurrence at Downes, allowed students to allay some of their fears.
“We just want to make sure that they're welcomed there and our people over there know who they have coming to them,” she said.
The event was referred to as a “signing day ceremony,” inspired by the ceremonies high school athletes often have when committing to a college.
“I played basketball, so it was nice to kind of go through that process of where teams are recruiting young people onto their teams,” Principal Michelle Shelton said. “This is symbolic of that. We have our students who have been 'recruited' into their middle school teams.”
Many of the 60 fifth-graders will move on to Shue-Medill Middle School, which is the normal feeder pattern. However, other students will be heading to one of at least eight other schools.
Sarah Hunt is first on the waiting list for Cab Calloway School of the Arts and has her fingers crossed that she'll be offered admission before the school year begins.
Hunt is a competitive dancer and learned about Cab from friends at her dance studio.
“I've heard really great things about it,” she said. “Their experience sounds really cool, so I said, why not try that? If that experience is going to help me with my technique, then I should go there.”
Hunt, who also wants to be a marine biologist or run her own dance studio one day, is looking forward to making new friends at Cab and having her own locker that she can decorate.
“I'm excited,” she said.
Ethan Capan is heading to Shue and said he's excited, as well as a bit nervous. He hopes to try out for Shue's basketball team.
One thing making the transition easier is knowing that his best friend from Downes will be going with him.
“Most of my classmates are going to Shue,” Capan added.
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