Remember Arlene Takahashi, Hunter's crush in season 14?
They seemed to have plans to have her in season 15/Next Class season 1 which were reworked into Yael. At that point Next Class was under the title New Generation
(also of note, at this point they had Goldi written but not cast yet)
Kinda makes sense considering in season 1 of Next Class Yael is introduced like if she's been friends with Hunter for a while yet we've never seen her before.