Changes happen in high school 24/7 From teachers, to classes and even friends, multiple decisions are made that diversify people. Senior Taylor Kincaid and junior Gage Higgs both agree that friends are made based on similar circumstances and an open mind.

“We encourage (others) and welcome them,” Kincaid said while describing additions to her friend group.

Kincaid and Higgs have friends who will remain lifetime friends mostly from extracurriculars, while others have people who come and go based on where they are in life and what they are doing at the moment. Kincaid and Higgs say they  understand they will not have the same friends in college but hope to keep in contact with specific some people from high school.

Being a part of an extracurricular, like theater, brings people together, according to Kincaid. She says many of the friends she has now she made through participating in various theatre activities.

“I became friends with (junior) Seejay Patel and (senior) Trae Bowman because they wanted to join crew,” Kincaid said. “They integrated into our friend group because they joined (the extracurricular activity I’m involved in).”

Higgs explains he also has no doubt that friends come from extracurriculars. While spending Friday nights on the football field during the fall and weekends on wrestling mats in the winter, he has had multiple opportunities to make new friends from the team.

Higgs says one of his strongest friendships, one with junior Ahmet Minnich, emerged during football season.

“I connected with him through sports,” Higgs said. “(Football) got us close.”

Kincaid acknowledges it will be hard to keep close with some of her current friends, but also knows some of them will be attending the same college as her.

Despite the distance and lack of free time she will encounter when she graduates, she recognizes school breaks as a time to reconnect with her distant friends.

“It will be hard to stay in touch, but I think that (my friends and I) will,” Kincaid said.

Higgs says that he will not stay in contact with some of the people he is friends with now. According to him, many of his friends he has made from being in class with, but his closer friends came from sports.

“Half of the people I talk to in high school I won’t see or talk to everyday like I do now,” Higgs said.

Assistant principal and Butler University graduate Amy Boone remembers her high school friend group changing based on the time of year. She says in high school, during the fall she had volleyball teammate friends, during the winter she had basketball friends and during the spring she had softball friends.

“As you go through different phases of your life, there are different things that you have in common with other people,” Boone said, “And that’s what pulls you together.”

Boone  says  that she still has a couple of main friends from school, but she keeps in touch with the rest of her classmates through social media.

To anyone finding themselves no longer connecting or socializing with their current friends, she encourages them to accept and welcome all potential friends no matter the differences.

“Don’t be close minded to getting close or being friends with anybody,” Boone said. “That is one thing I remember from high school.”