Olivia West, Editor
@oliviawcourant
The high school’s distance learning schedule will change to a block schedule where classes meet on alternate days beginning Monday, March 23, according to an announcement by Principal William Egan. This news came the day after Superintendent Bryan Luizzi released the information that schools will remain closed until at least April 20.
Since Friday, March 13, the high school has been operating under a schedule where all eight classes meet for forty minutes, from 8:30 am until 2:30 pm, with no set break for lunch. This will shift, however, to a type of block schedule, with four classes meeting for an hour each day, and a thirty minute break for lunch.
On A day, periods one through four will meet from 8:30 until 1:40 and periods five through eight will meet from the same time on B day. At the end of every day, there will be forty minutes for an unstructured and independent reading time.
In his announcement, Mr. Egan said that he hoped the change would reduce any stress that was present due to distance learning. “We feel it will help positively impact the pace of the school day and provide time for our students to delve deeper into their learning,” he said.
While the student reaction was mixed, many thought that the new schedule would accomplish Mr. Egan’s goals of reducing stress and increasing the amount of learning they’d receive. Will Haddad, a junior, said that in the current forty-minute classes, teachers and students were scrambling to achieve the same level of comprehension that they would in a normal school day. “Normally when we’re at school, the teacher teaches the lesson and then we apply it in our homework. However, a lot of what’s happening now is that they’re combining these two things and it isn’t very effective,” he said. “With the new schedule, I don’t think that teachers should increase the amount of work during the hour, but use the time to teach it and then let us do our work.”
“I also think that it’s good that we have a period set aside for lunch, as right now I try to eat when I can, meaning it’s always rushed and a distraction when I’m trying to work,” Will said. “Lastly, I think that the time at the end of the day allocated towards reading and catching up is brilliant. Nowadays, we don’t have any time to read for ourselves, and this period will help us unwind everyday.”
Sophomore Douglas Gillespie also had a positive take on the new block schedule, as he found that, although teachers were doing their best to keep stress levels low, it wasn’t always effective. “I do believe that the new block scheduling will make e-learning less stressful and me more productive. It’s hard to communicate and do a lesson plan through e-learning with only a 40 minute period of time and no homework. Hopefully, the new block scheduling will fix this, and I believe it will.”
Natalie Plosker, a freshman, said that the workload with all eight classes meeting everyday got to be too much, and she oftentimes had homework even though teachers aren’t supposed to assign any. “I think block scheduling is a more effective way of learning because it allows students more time to adapt to new information,” she said. “With four classes a day, the work will become so much less stressful and time consuming.”
While most predict that the new block schedule will be effective, senior Sophia Palamenti thought that the inconsistency of classes would make her less productive. “Personally, connecting with each of my teachers during our all classes meet schedule during the 40 minutes periods has been effective and I feel as though I haven’t been stressed about the workload,” she said. “By meeting with each teacher each day, I’ve been able to continue my normal routine that closely mirrors what my actual school schedule was. I am used to dropping once every eight days so going from that to now meeting two or three times a week is a huge change.”
As schools close around the country, nearly everyone needs to adapt to this new routine of online school amid a global pandemic. “The change might take some time getting used to, but then again we’ve adapted to the new system of e-learning fairly quickly,” Will said. “While none of this is normal, we have to make the best of our circumstances and see what the future of the coronavirus brings.”
