"It's been really fun. I have a lot of nice teachers," said Heaton, who was taking part in Cass High School's freshman open house.
She was one of several students, as well as parents, who toured the Grassdale Road facility during the afternoon session. But had things gone differently, the school they could have been touring would have been off Cass-White Road.
The district continues to build a new Cass High School, which will replace the current Cass when it opens. System officials when they began the construction process planned to open the school at the start of the 2010-2011 school year, which begins Monday.
But delaying the school's opening was the discovery of and the damage caused by more than two dozen sinkholes on the property. The sinkholes necessitated additional construction and repairs, which pushed the site's expected substantial completion and final completion dates.
Superintendent John Harper on Friday said the work remains on pace to put students and staff in the new facility next semester -- Jan. 4, the first day of the second half of the school year.
"Our substantial completion date is Oct. 29. We had a meeting this week with Turner [Construction] and several people who are putting our movement plan together for getting over there and in that school, moving books and moving the teachers' personal belongings," Harper said. "We'll have several more meetings to make sure we get that correct, but it's working really well.
"We talked to the principal, [Mike] Nelson, in our meeting this week and said 'Have a lot of conversation with your student body and with your staff about how we're going to transition there,'" he added. "We have some equipment that's coming ... and as that gets voted in [by the school board], Oct. 29, we expect that stuff to be placed there in the different areas."
Heaton said she was not disappointed about starting her first year of high school in the current Cass.
"I'm excited that I'll get to go to the new school. It'll just be bigger and cooler, I guess," she said. "My sister went here, so I pretty much know everywhere. I've been in the building lots of times."
"I was kind of looking forward to her starting out the school year in the new school and everything, but it will be alright," said her mother, Michelle Heaton, adding that the new Cass is right down the road from their home in White. She said the extra time spent on the school will ensure things are in order before operations there begin.
"I think they're going to have it all under control by the time it's ready, and they'll make sure it's safe and won't let the kids go to school there until everything's done," she said.
Like Brieanna, other entering freshmen said they were looking forward to starting in the brand new school in the next calendar year.
"I wanted to, and it's going to be difficult when we change," said Ashlynn Russell, who comes to the high school by way of Cass Middle. She added that she was looking forward to making new friends in her first year at the school, but also was excited about her future school's athletic offerings.
"Its softball field, we won't have to take a bus to it," she said, referring to the current softball field near STARS Pre-K.
Fellow freshman Will Anderson said he too was excited about the new school year and the opportunity to start at the new site in the coming months.
"They told us that it wasn't going to be ready, and I was kind of disappointed because I wanted to go to that one, but they said it was going to be open in January, so I can't wait to go to that, too," Anderson said.
"But it's going to tough, because I've got to learn this school and the next school I go to. They probably will have to do another [open house], because nobody else knows the school."