The 2020-2021 school year began with students bright-eyed and bushy-tailed from the previous spring-long quarantine, with many new and returning students having  high hopes for a fun and engaging year. However, lots of students stayed online.

   “I was tired of online,” senior Regan Wilkerson said. “I knew they were going to make the school safer [because of Covid-19], but it is hard to have the mask rule enforced with every student.” 

  Wilkerson is for masks — she does not want others or herself to get sick. The Christian county mayor agreed on this part because, on Oct. 14, Christian county went under a mask mandate. Before this order was announced, some stores encouraged people to wear masks, and others enforced it.

   Some believe that the mask mandate should have been implemented earlier. Freshman John Perry agrees with this idea.

   “I thought it was long overdue,” Perry said. “Masks are scientifically proven to stop/slow the spread of coronavirus, so having an order in place to use them for what they are for makes sense,” 

  While masks are required at school it is down to the individual and how they choose to abide by the precautions set in place. Luckily extra protection has arisen since the start of the school year with the vaccine.

   Before the vaccine, teachers would give lectures without a mask at the front of the class to be heard better. This vaccine gives extra precaution to limit higher precincts of the virus. 

   “It gives me comfort to know that the people in charge are setting an example to be safe and take proper precautions,” Perry said.

  Winter snow also helped limit the spread of covid. Two full weeks of school turned into online days, late starts and early releases. The month of February was cold and snowy which caused some issues with assignments. While some students fell behind and tried to catch up, others stayed on track with their school work. 

   Wilkerson believes that while it was easy to stay caught up on her homework, it was hard to teach herself. However, Perry seemed to have the opposite issue — he did not feel motivated to push himself to keep up with his assignments. 

   “It was very nice to have that time to relax, especially after the incredibly stressful and rigorous weeks before, but it hit a point where it just seemed antagonizing and it seemed like we were all just kind of over it,” Perry said. 

  After that, not much changed for a while until Nixa went to court — the basketball court. The boy’s basketball team had an outstanding season. With hopes to go to state, it was easy to see why their season was an attention holder. Perry does not know much about sports, but is still very enthusiastic about them.

   “I keep up as much as I can,” Perry said. “Many game nights, we would have a rehearsal for whatever show theater was putting on at the time, and when we weren’t working, we would try to go stand by the doors to support the players and team.”

  School spirit seemed to carry the basketball team through a good season. While they did not go to state, they had an unforgettable year and are ready to take on the next because they know, while this past year has been all over the place, it only gets better from here.