It’s that time of the year again. Seniors rev up for their final year in high school, upperclassmen dread the arrival of new freshmen and students choose their classes for next year.This past week counselors went around to classrooms and helped students understand exactly how to choose courses for the upcoming year, however, that’s not the only effort RBHS has put toward getting students prepared.
Yesterday, in an attempt to prepare for high school and the new challenges that come with secondary education at RBHS, upcoming freshman and their families attended the annual course fair. From 5:30 – 7:00 p.m. on Jan. 21,  families were welcomed to walk around the school and visit 15-minute introductory sessions for core classes such as Civic Studies and Physics while also having the freedom to learn about student extracurriculars and what languages and electives  RBHS offers.  
Civic Studies teacher Austin Reed spent the night detailing what his class provides students.
“[We base our first unit on ‘Freedom with Responsibility’ because] kids come and they’ll automatically go ‘Rock bridge is awesome! I can do whatever I want, this is cool!’ and we go, ‘You are so far left field,’” Reed said. “What we teach [students] is not only ‘Get immense amounts of freedom,’ but we’re going to ask so much of you that you’re going to kind of hate us.”
Besides the challenge of regular classes, students also get the choice to pick Advanced Placement (AP) or Honors classes. As senior Hanna Abdul knows, the extra work helps to provide a better foundation going into college.
Abdul has focused on learning more about the medical field and is currently taking an Emergency Medical Technician class at the CACC. However, Abdul says her favorite class so far has been Principles of Biomedical Sciences because of its in-depth material over genetics that widens her eyes to all of the possibilities in the medical field.
“I’ve been taking more of the science classes such as [Project Lead the Way,] Principles of Biomedical Sciences at the Career Center, Human Body Systems in eleventh grade and right now I’m in AP Biology and Emergency Medical Technician class at the Career Center,” Abdul said. “Basically sophomore year I thought maybe I wanted to become a doctor but since taking all these classes I’ve learned about different careers so I’m just trying to explore and see which one suits me best.”
Although challenges are important when it comes to learning, Performing Arts teacher Holly Maness believes that including courses that both push a student’s limits and appeal to a student’s interests is the key to success. She also thinks that Performing Arts classes aid student’s lives more than they might expect.
“I love to tell students that you’re absolutely going to use the things you learn in Performing Arts courses because we all have to perform at different times in our lives. [It could be that] you want to get better at getting up in front of people and just pushing yourself to try that. It can [also] help with interview skills,” Maness said. “You also learn more about theater which requires us to put together programs, assemble lights, to build sets, to get in front of people, to interact, [and] to be a community. All of those skills are things people can use no matter what their future is. It’s a great way to practice them, get confident with them and get wherever you’re going to go in life.”[vc_empty_space height=”50px”][TS_VCSC_HTML5_Audio audio_mp3_local=”280882″ audio_theme=”totallylookslike” audio_poster=”280880″][TS_VCSC_HTML5_Audio audio_mp3_local=”280885″ audio_theme=”totallylookslike” audio_poster=”280884″]