For some incoming freshmen, the transition from middle to high school can be an overwhelming one. But every year, Leadership’s Community Commission hopes to ease this transition for middle school students by allowing them to experience high school for a day.
“The shadowing helps middle schoolers see what high school is like,” Community commissioner junior Vivian Duong said. “The [high school] classroom setting and learning experience are completely different.”

Eighth graders will have the opportunity to shadow MVHS students on March 19, a staff learning day for all Cupertino Union School District schools. According to Duong, though nearly 200 middle students applied to shadow, there were only enough MVHS hosts for 75 students from schools like Kennedy, McAuliffe, Hyde and Cupertino Middle Schools to participate in the program.

In order to provide eighth graders with a comprehensive glimpse of high school, the commissioners will take interests and hobbies into consideration when pairing middle and high school students. For example, a middle school student who enjoys badminton may shadow a student on the badminton team. In addition, with course selection for incoming freshmen approaching, the event will give middle school students a preview of high school classes, like it did for junior Simona Kotesova three years ago as an eighth grader at KMS.

“It was a good way to see the inside [of high school],” said Kotesova, who is now a part of the Leadership class. “It was nice to see how the teachers and students interacted.”