New schedule is not necessary
Starting this school year, all California schools, by the command of Senate Bill 328, have a mandated start time of no earlier than 8:30 a.m. Even though this is just a short 15 minutes later than NPHS’ previous start time, our day to day schedule has been changed in what seems like the most drastic way possible.
The block schedule students have enjoyed for the past years has been replaced with an A day, B day model. Additionally, instead of one short day completing school at 12:40 p.m., NPHS students now have a later release time, 2:25 p.m, for the first three days of the week and 1:45 p.m release for the final two days of the school week.
This new schedule was introduced by the California chapter, Start School Later, an organization of scientists and psychologists with a mission to create a “more developmentally appropriate school schedule.” Though the extra 15 minutes of sleep may be paramount to some students, it is confusing as to why the entirety of the previous schedule had to be changed to accommodate for these few extra minutes.
The old block schedule has been discontinued and replaced by the new model because of required school hours as well as a voted desire to try something new. NPHS’ infamous college-like block schedule was claimed to not be able to hold up these requirements, yet some schools in Santa Barbara districts (who are affected by the same mandated start time) still boast a similar block schedule, proving that it is still indeed possible to achieve under the new mandates.
The downside of this new schedule is its class load; now all classes for the entire year are taken at the same time, making more class work and homework for students, many who are used to only having to juggle three classes at a time. Additionally, the later start and finishing times make our schedule hard for working parents who have to drop their kids off of school and student athletes who must now stay later in the day for after school practice. The new schedule includes a time set away for student “CPT” but it is still not clear to me what students should be doing during this time. I think that further communication to parents as to these details of the schedule would have created a smoother transition.
On the contrary, the schedule does create some advantages, each Thursday and Friday students get out at an earlier time of 1:40 p.m., creating more time to get homework done on those days. Additionally, zero period students, such as myself, enjoy a 30 minute later start time which has proven crucial to my modified morning routine.
With some small adjustments to comply with the new required start time, NPHS would be able to bring back the old block schedule. It is something that has been proven to be possible and would be much preferred by many students because of the lesser homework load and class load. Though, if the current schedule is decided to be kept, efforts to explain its benefits and new aspects should be made public and easy to access, as an understanding may generate better results.
