A preschool student walks into MCHS. She walks across the hall, hand in hand with her high school teacher to the Lil´ Warrior Preschool. She hangs up her bag and gets ready for her day at school. While her high school teacher is not much older than she is, she is excelling in school; thanks to her dedicated teacher.

In this program, high school students teach preschoolers three times a week. The two days of the week the kids are not present are for the students to plan lessons and prepare.

All high school students must take child development before taking this class. Students taking this class also get an early childhood education credential.

The preschool lab program has been a staple at MCHS for several decades. 

This program has been around for years, spanning even before preschool teacher Melissa Farris joined the program.

“It goes way back, when I first started I was at east campus and there were photo albums of the preschool from like the 1970s,” said Farris.

Over the years, MCHS has kept this program to benefit both students and our community. Students going into most any field with children will benefit from this course.

Senior Lacey Thompson says, “I want to do early education in college so I wanted to get a good experience and a hands-on feel for it.”

With many students taking this class, the help this course gives them for future careers is unmatched.

“It gives you that little step into teaching… to understand all the things that go into being a teacher,” said junior Samantha Andresen.

Junior Maggie Evans enjoys hanging out with children as she used to babysit.

Children from the community get taught by high school students and form this connection with them. They also get to see the school they will hopefully attend in the future.

Students get many benefits from taking this course in high school.

“It is a really good program for the students and they get to work one on one with preschoolers for the entire year,” said Farris. “So they get to see all of their growth and development that occurs in that year.” 

Upon giving students the early childhood education credential, they get experience and tactics for the future.

“I decided o take this class because I was influenced by my older sister, and I saw how they work with kids and thought it would be good for my upcoming career,” said sophomore Hannah Pahlke.

Students put in the hard work and get to see the positive outcomes.

“It was not necessarily easy but I think it is important if you are going to go into something with children,” said Andresen.