By Maddie Soldaat
Senior Mackemzie Lipps says she remembers before school had even started being anxious during Freshman Orientation because her best friend had recently moved. She wasn’t close with many people.
She says she didn’t have her person by her side with her anymore. That was until she met Corbin Malchow.
They hit it off and stayed friends throughout all their years at Delta.
High school. A time in everyone’s life where you hang out with friends every day, meet new people, and learn new things. It is a time to remember.
Mackemzie says the most important thing she wants to retain from Delta is the memories of all the good times she had.
“What I really want to remember is the lessons I learned and the impact I made on the school and the people,” Mackemzie says.
She says most of her good memories are her funniest memories. But the one she remembers clearly is the thing she feared most going into high school … falling down the stairs her first day of freshman year.
“I’m a klutz,” Mackemzie says.
She was wearing a long dress and as she was walking down the stairs she stepped on the dress and went tumbling down. All of her stuff went flying in the air.
She says now when she looks back at the moment she laughs, but at the time she did not.
Mackemzie says one day that specifically wasn’t good was during her junior year when she had just recently got her license. As she was pulling out of the school she hit the car in front of her. She had not pressed the brake down all the way.
She had to get out of the car in front of lots of students to assess the situation.
“It was awful,” Mackemzie says.
She says Riley Dance Marathon has always been a highlight of her high school career, but junior year was the best.
She says her close friend, Grace Flowers, was the RDM president and getting to see her friend accomplish a huge goal and get to work alongside her was an awesome experience.
Senior Marcus Bright says one of the funniest memories he can recall was when Mackemzie Lipps fell down the stairs the first day of freshman year.
“It was unfortunate circumstances, but it was pretty funny,” Marcus says.
On the first day of school he says he also remembers walking the hallways and how different it felt from the middle school
“They seemed super intimidating, and super old,” Marcus says.
Over time he got used to it and eventually became a senior himself.
Winning sectionals on the football team as a junior is something Marcus says is the best memory he has from high school.
Being able to complete such a huge goal can be a surreal moment and he won’t forget it.
Marcus says although school was stressful and school work stinks, it doesn’t matter because you get to spend time with your friends constantly and make memories that will last a lifetime.
“You gotta remember it for the good parts,” Marcus says.
Senior Annie Jackson says one of her favorite memories is going to Ball State for her English class. Part of the trip involves lunch at Mancino’s.
She says her group got to explore the kitchen and interview people working there and it was a neat experience.
Every year when Ms. Craw’s English classes go on the field trip they always do the Mancino’s pizza challenge.
“It was really fun to watch that,” Annie says.
She says even though it was gross, she would still like to go back there so she could hang out with her friend and have a great time.
Luckily Annie says she doesn’t have many bad memories. But she has had some bad experiences.
During her junior year she said she was a teacher’s aide in the office and had to do things to help out around the school. It wasn’t a problem, but she did hate having to deliver packages.
“I would open the door and the whole class would just stare at me,” Annie says
She also hated having to pull kids out of class. She would interrupt a lecture and it would just be an awkward interaction.
While she is still in high school she says she wants to remember all the fun she had and all the memories she made.
“People always say, ‘These are the best years of your life,’ and I want to remember it like that,” Annie says.
She says she will never forget picking out a table to sit at in the morning on the first day of freshman year.
Even though it’s just a table she says it has sentimental value to her and her friends.
They have sat at the same table in the same spots every day since the first. It’s always stayed the same and it always will.
Senior Gavin Case says he can remember as a freshman going an entire biology class without a teacher.
The teacher, Mr. Adam Lennon, had gotten stuck in an elevator. The rest of the time Gavin and his friends messed around.
“It was a class with almost all of my friends so that made it even better,” Gavin says.
He had some good times, but also had some bad.
It was the week of finals and he needed to stay above a 60% in order to pass. When the final grades came in he got a 59%, just barely under what he needed.
On the other hand, he said his friend who had been failing the class managed to get a 62%.
One thing Gavin says he remembers vividly is freshman orientation. He got to meet up with all his friends and roam a new environment.
It was a fun event that got the school year off to a good start.
Throughout all of his years in high school he says he and his friends would break some rules.
Gavin says he and his friends would sometimes ask the teacher to go to the bathroom, but instead would go to their friend’s classroom.
They would ask to borrow said friend and just hang out for a little, then go back to class as normal.
“In reality we just wanted to hang out with our friends,” Gavin says.
Senior Hailee Hamilton says the last day of school has always been the best. She and her friends would meet up and have a huge bonfire, burning all their schoolwork.
She says they would eat ice cream, have conversation and just hang out. It’s one of the things she looks forward to most when the end of school is approaching.
During the beginning of her freshman year she says she got sick with COVID and was out for weeks.
She was behind on work and stressed, but there were some people who were there to help.
“That’s when I met all of my friends,” Hailee says. So even though being sick isn’t fun she made friends that she would have lots of fun with.
One funny, not so funny thing happened to her friend group. She says it took place when she sent a meme to fellow senior Isaac Brewer.
She says it was about a recent haircut he had gotten, which happened to be a buzzcut. It was a picture of a Shrek character, who looked similar.
He was not happy about it and didn’t talk to her for a month. She says the tension went down eventually and everything was back to normal and now it’s remembered as a funny incident.
Even though she has had some bad memories she says she wants to focus on the good and remember all the fun times she has had.
“I want to remember it as a time of growth,” Hailee says.
Senior Zane Cline says the first day of high school will always be a core memory. He remembers arriving at school. His older sister, a junior at the time, was driving.
It was one of the first memories he had at Delta.
“Just the whole first-day feeling and how different it was from middle school,” Cline says.
As a junior Zane says winning regionals in baseball was a big accomplishment. He and his team had worked hard to get to that moment and it finally happened.
Another good memory was lunch during his sophomore year, but one specifically. He says a kid who would later transfer, Jon Rains, squeezed a chocolate milk and it went everywhere.
Everyone at the table got soaked from head to toe in chocolate milk; it even got on Jude Linton’s white hoodie.
Zane says he will unfortunately not forget the time he was walking from the lunch line to his table and he tripped.
Food went flying and so did he. “It was pretty embarrassing,” he says.
During his time here he says he will never forget his lifelong friends.
Being able to have all of the high school experiences and skills that Delta has set up for him for the future will help greatly.
“High school will definitely have a big lasting impact on my future,” he says.
Senior Fancy Robbins says she wants to remember her friends. She hangs out with her friends every day and once she graduates it won’t be like that.
“I want to remember hanging out with my friends before ‘adult life,’” Robbins says.
Once she leaves the nest she will get more responsibilities and more stress.
But she says the memories of her hanging out with friends will always be a good flashback.
At the beginning of her journey she says she remembers walking to class with her friends. One of her friends, Jude Linton, was bored.
He decided to throw himself down the stairs in front on Ms. Joey Gossett, then the assistant principal. He didn’t get in huge trouble, but he did get a stern talking to.
Softball will always play a big part in her high school career. She says her high school years wouldn’t be the same without it.
“The bus rides were my favorite,” Robbins says.
Everyone is singing, talking, and getting ready to play and she says it’s a very fun atmosphere.
During her freshman year she says she got pulled up to varsity for softball.
She remembers being really nervous but at the same time excited since not many freshmen get this chance.
This is one of the many things she says that have made her high school years so great.
Senior Cooper Bratton says he will always remember the first day of school since Tilmon Clark dressed up in an eagle costume welcoming students.
He says nothing like that had really happened at the middle school so he noticed the change quickly.
“I was kinda like, ‘Whoa this is high school,’” Cooper says. “This is gonna be a lot different.”
During his basketball season his senior year he says his team won regionals against Fort Wayne Blackhawk Christian.
“A lot of people doubted us,” Cooper says. But he and his team proved them wrong.
Cooper says an incident in Mr. Brewer’s biology class his junior year was embarrassing. He and Marcus Bright had to give a presentation.
From the beginning to the end of the presentation they were laughing and laughing and couldn’t stop.
“I don’t think Mr. Brewer was too happy about that,” Cooper says.
In the end he says everybody moves on and he hopes to remember lots of names and good times as the years go beyond school.
He says he has known most of the people from his class since kindergarten and seeing them from a different perspective is unreal.
“Being a senior it’s kinda weird,” Cooper says. “Like we’re all gonna go on our own path.”
