On the morning of 17th November, 2023, Canyon Vista was preparing for what seemed to be the most awaited trip of the year for the 8th graders, the trip to the Westwood high school. As the morning bell rang, all the 8th graders ran to their advisory with a pursuit of excitement hanging over their heads

“I was really excited to see how big Westwood is, how the campus looked like and like all the high schoolers,” Said Jyotsna Rao.

All the 8th graders were held in their advisory until around 9:30, each of them was given a set of instructions to strictly obey, a travel buddy whom they had to be with at all times and a westwood shirt that fit a selective few the way that they wanted too.

Every year, all the 8th graders, when it comes nearing the time of the thanksgiving break, go on the Westwood trip. This trip was an initiative taken by Canyon Vista somewhere around the year 2013 to give students a life like experience of a high school and how they might have to access their classes the following year. Ms.Angela Buentello was an active helper and team lead through most of the trips that were organized to Westwood.

“At first I just helped students get on the bus but as I became a team lead I started helping plan and organize them. But then this year, we kinda have new team leads so the roles almost change every year,” said Buentello. 

The Westwood trip is designed to take you to most of the westwood classes, to narrow it down, the ones that are the most diverse, unique, and interesting electives/class.The best art of the trip is Canyon Vista spends no money and the trip is sponsored entirely by Westwood. For this year, after a quick tour of some of the classes offered at Westwood, all the students were directed to the gigantic gym for a pep rally. The pep rally contained games, a brief history of westwood, a dance by the Sun dancers and much more. 

“I think the overall trip, in a 10, was an 8. The bus ride wasn’t that fun as it was really quiet. Some of the classes like the theater and the one where they were cutting wood was really cool but I wished we explored the other classes as well,” said Saara Samnani.

At around 11:30, all the 8th graders got on the bus back to Canyon Vista. Once they reached they were again directed to their advisory and stayed there until lunch. Although this year, the trip wasn’t as long as everyone expected it too. One of the buses was very late to arrive which made the students riding that bus late to Westwood giving them less exploring time. The past few years, the same thing has been happening which makes many students and teachers disappointed. This is because of the abundant decrease in the number of bus drivers. 

“ There hasn’t really been anything that goes wrong on trips but the buses are always a problem. They have been arriving late these past few years and the later the arrive, the less time our students get at Westwood,” said Ms. Buentello.