For many highschoolers dreaming of going to college or stepping foot on a college campus is important and a lifelong dream. Finally having the freedom to be involved in college life, gaining the ability to make your own decisions and experiencing life on your own terms with no adult supervision. For many that seems to be four years away, but here in Natchitoches, some high schoolers have already been given that privilege.
At Northwestern State University of Louisiana, just shy of 50 feet away from the John S. Kyser Hall building, lies the dorms and classrooms of the Louisiana School for Math, Science and the Arts. A high school where students from all over the state choose to attend boarding school to advance their learning knowledge and gain adult responsibilities.
Since LSMSA is located close to NSU, it is the first time that these high school students have ever been on the campus of an actual college.
Layla Navarre, a senior at LSMSA, is very grateful for having the exposure and ability to be close to a college campus that allows LSMSA students to obtain resources that NSU provides.
“I enjoy being so close to a college. We have the opportunity to walk to football games and performing arts shows, and we can usually get into different events for free as well,” Navarre said.
Senior Ade Adjignon is very grateful for being located at NSU for a different reason: exposure. Adjignon agrees that Natchitoches is a smaller town for a college but it is held at a different and much more powerful stance.
“I often complain about how small Natchitoches is as a college town, but NSU has a presence all over the city,” Adjignon said. “Most places work to help NSU students have an easier and happier time, and LSMSA definitely benefits from this as well.”
LSMSA students are not just allowed access to physical events, they also have many resources to use academically that NSU provides for them.
“It’s not uncommon to see an LSMSA student logging into the JSTOR online database because of our school’s connection to NSU. Dual enrollment is also a big part of LSMSA’s academic culture, and none of it would be possible without cooperation from NSU,” Adjignon said.
With the help of the dual enrollment provided by NSU, a large majority of students who have attended LSMSA have had the ability to skip years of college due to already taking college courses.
Students attending LSMSA often have families that may be an hour away or four hours away, so gaining responsibility and discipline is all up to them.
“I’ve learned that finding nice places to spend time outside is important to me. While I’m deciding which colleges to apply to, some of the things I consider are walkability and trees. I’ve also learned that parking is probably going to be a nightmare. Even at a relatively small school, it gets bad,” Navarre said.
But with every positive comes some sort of negative whether it be big or small, it is still an issue that students of a younger age, who are learning a new way of life, will focus on.
Since LSMSA students have free range anywhere on NSU’s campus, the lines between who is a college student and who isn’t can often become blurred, after all, they do share the same experiences.
“Getting mistaken for a college student can often make me uncomfortable, and it does happen quite often,” Adjignon said.
For LSMSA students, it can be a distinct experience that has helped them flourish as a student and taught them lessons of adulthood. The teachers of LSMSA have already experienced college life and have their own experiences being located close to college life once again in their life.
Morris Tichenor, an associate instructor that holds a doctorate in Latin, Greek and Classic, has been an appointed teacher at LSMSA since 2018 and he has experienced much while teaching at LSMSA and working next to college life.
For Tichenor, being back around the college life is just a normal experience and finds it strange being back around highschoolers.
“Most LSMSA teachers have taught at universities before. Myself, I came straight from a grad program, where I was teaching undergraduate and other graduate students,” Tichenor said.
From his perspective as a teacher, he notes that his students are being taught great life lessons that they get to experience in a liminal safe space where they have residential life staff to assist them and check-in on them.
“They’re responsible for managing their own time. Although they have to be in the dorms and in their rooms by certain hours, they decide how late they stay up working or socializing and how much sleep they get,” Tichenor said.
Tichenor noted that a selling point for him to take the job at LSMSA was the proximity to the Eugene P. Watson Memorial Library. For him, being an academic with an active research agenda, it was a necessity to have the access he has to the library.
“College campuses, with their own little ecosystems of campus police, facilities, and elementary schools provide a lovely little work home, and I’m glad LSMSA gets to be its own little smurf village on the edge of that,” Tichenor said.
Even though college can be scary when young high schoolers haven’t experienced an environment of this caliber before, there are hidden gems and accessible resources that make it an easy transition for students and teachers.
