Students get first day in their new school

COMMERCE CITY - The third largest high school ever built in Colorado opened its doors on Friday in Commerce City giving students their first use of their community's investment.

The new 300,000 square-foot Adams City High School was approved by voters in 2006, making it the first new school in the Adams 14 District since 1967.

Principal Wes Paxton said Friday afternoon, he can already tell a difference the new building is making.

"I've seen a lot of smiling faces today, and I can tell you from the interaction with the students that they're excited to be here and to be a part of the new Adams City High School," he said.

Senior Justin Scott says all the changes gave him a reason to be excited about his first day back.

"I was actually excited to come to school this morning, that's the first time in three years," he said.

Junior Donavon Maes says he's most excited about the theater and wrestling room at the new school.

"It's like boom, upgrade, it's just like a step up, it feels good," Maes said.

Some changes take a little more getting used to. With the new school, the students are required for the first time to adhere to a dress code consisting of polo shirts in school colors, and nice pants: black, white, or khaki.

"At first, honestly I was really upset about it," said senior Patricia Ybarra.

Students can pick their accessories and fancy footwear is fair game.

"Like these?" smiled Ybarra over her new shoes.

Paxton says he sees the new school as a new beginning for everyone.

"You really want to set the tone for many, many years to come, and you want make sure you raise the bar for the students because you want them to be successful," Paxton said.

Adams City saw an increase in its graduation rates last year when it reached 66%, and Paxton has high expectations that number will go up as students take advantage of the new tools and resources available to them.

"We wanted to create a state of the art facility that had state of the art technology so that our students were really having access to the tools so that they can get ready to go out to college or into the workforce," Paxton said.

English teacher Todd Mayville made sure to tell his students on Friday just how lucky they were to have a brand new school.

"Go home and thank mom and dad, thank the parents who said we'll invest in this for our kids," he told them.