Back To School
Hundreds of students gather in the quad during lunch.
Have you noticed the campus brimming with extra students this year? CI is crawling with an extra 319 students this 2019-20 school year. The total number of enrolled students last year was 2,443; this year, that number is at 2,762.
Mr. Roger Adams, CI principal, knows no particular reason for the drastic increase but does think a large amount of the new enrollments were past students who decided to return to the Islands. One thing Mr. Adams knows for sure, however, is how welcoming CI’s environment and community is.
“I don’t know why our number of students grew but I do know that CI has an inviting, familial atmosphere with the most spirit that I’ve seen from any school I’ve worked at,” says Mr. Adams.
Andrea Rodriguez, a senior, has experienced all drastic and minor alterations CI has undergone the past four years, but this increase in students has definitely caught her attention.
“During lunch and nutrition, I can’t go through certain areas because of how crowded it gets. It seems more hectic and lines are even longer,” says Rodriguez.
As a result of the additional students on campus, the school has resorted to implementing a travelling system in which some teachers migrate to separate classrooms every period.
This isn’t the first year CI has used this travelling system, but there is a greater number of teachers migrating this time around than previous years.
A new English teacher and CI alumna, Ms. Lesly Fernandez, is being welcomed to the Islands with a much more hectic schedule than other teachers. Her experience with the travelling system has been frustrating at times but exciting for the most part.
“It’s a lot, especially since it’s my first year of teaching, but I embrace the chaos,” says Ms. Fernandez.
A question often asked regarding the travelling system is how teachers keep track of and store their materials. Luckily for Ms. Fernandez, she has an office area that’s connected to a classroom she uses for one period. There she is able to leave printed copies and other materials, as well as the single cabinets designated to her in each separate classroom.
Another useful resource she is using to her advantage are CI’s new Chromebooks. The ability to assign digital tasks to students is surely a big help considering her active schedule.
“I’m really glad that the technology 1:1 came this year because without it I don’t know how I would carry around all of my paper materials to five classrooms every day,” says Ms. Fernandez.
Despite the campus congestion, CI welcomes all new incoming Raiders ready to tackle another eventful year at the Islands.
