After a year and a half of online school, the current school year was looked at by students as an exciting opportunity to finally be able to live a semi-normal life again. Students were looking forward to reconnecting with old friends and getting used to the normal school feel. 

The first semester back in school was definitely not one to forget. At the start of the school year, students were thrown into full capacity in-person school for the first time since March 2020. This meant that school activities such as football games and other sporting events were back in session, which was a big win for the students. 

The first football game at home could not have been any better. Wootton played Gaithersburg in their home opener in front of over 1,000 people. What made the game even better was that the football team snapped their two-season losing streak, beating Gaithersburg 13-0. 

Senior wide receiver and cornerback Max Gracyalny had multiple catches that game and an interception. “The home opener was definitely my favorite football game ever. The stadium was the most packed I had ever seen it, and we also won our first game in two years in front of a crazy student section,” Gracyalny said. 

Girls’ soccer was even more impressive in the fall, having one of their best seasons ever. They performed so well throughout the whole season that they won counties. “The group of girls that we had this year was special and I will never forget how much fun we had as a group,” senior defender Nicole Jesek said.

Sports were definitely not the only highlight of the first semester though, as there were plenty of funny and interesting events going on in the building. For example, for about a month, an Instagram account called @woottonbathroomfeet took the school by storm for taking pictures of people’s feet while they were in the bathroom stalls. For a good two weeks, students constantly talked about how they did not want to use the bathroom because they were scared of being put on the account, but it was all in good fun. 

There was also a debacle in the school parking lot for a couple of weeks when countless students got their parking passes temporarily taken away for going out the wrong way in the parking lot in order to avoid traffic. The class of 2022 fought their best against the administration to enable turning out of the parking lot the wrong way but their efforts ended up falling short. 

Senior Shane Miller got his parking pass taken away for a day and remembers the whole debacle panning out. “For a good two weeks in every other class, one of my classmates would get pulled out of the classroom by Mrs. Hancock to get their pass taken away. And every time it happened the whole class would collectively laugh,” Miller said. 

As a senior myself, the first semester has been my favorite semester throughout my whole time here and I cannot wait to see what the second semester possesses for this school.