Fall term schedule
By Clark Wu
The Academy shared their spring term schedule with The Exonian in late January (posted on Instagram on January 26). I remember seeing a bunch of people reposting the Week 1 and Week 2 graphics on their stories, celebrating the prospect of normalcy, the 9 a.m. weekday classes and the free Wednesdays.
What we didn’t notice, expect, or frankly look at closely enough to assess, were the shortened lunch blocks, the possibility of having three academic classes in a row and the difficulty in sitting down for five extra minutes in every class. Details that eventually became the subject of our complaints were actually handed to us a month and a half before its implementation.
As such, my first ask for the fall term schedule: send a draft out to students in an all-school email early (in July, if possible) and collect feedback. I also hope that the Academy could share with those of us not involved in the planning process what actually went into the decision-making and what constraints/minimum requirements (number of classes, etc.) there are so we could give educated suggestions.
I recognize that some problems of practicality could only be solved once we come to it, but we should still try to preemptively sidestep some red flags.
With that said, I want to highlight a few things I’d like to see in the fall:
Keep the 9 a.m. start (if only for a majority of classes) and breakfast open past 10 a.m.
If people didn’t eat breakfast last year...well, they sure didn’t this year either. The majority of students I’ve spoken to find the 9 a.m. start a saving grace, especially on Mondays. This is especially true for day students.
With the 9 a.m. start in mind, I personally tend to work a little later into the night knowing that I have more room for flexibility and more time to sleep. On most days I now wake up at around 8:45 to change and wash up before classes. Unfortunately this doesn’t leave much room for breakfast (except for those lucky ducks at the Inn with delivered breakfast). Last year classes started at 8, breakfast ended at 9—reasonable for those with a free second block to get some quick food in the morning. If operations at the dining halls allow, can we keep the current extended breakfast period?
Bring back reserves
For new students, the reserve is a weekly 75-minute block for every class. This additional time is typically used by science and math classes to catch up on material or allow a bit of extra time for tests and labs. In history and English classes, this is the usual block for release time before a paper is due. Concert Choir reserves were AMAZING last year. I believe teachers find reserves spectacularly useful. If we put reserve blocks before lunch blocks, it also means that students come to lunch in waves, thus avoiding the long lines.
Keep the 10 minute interim time between classes
This is the time that usually makes my day. I might be able to sleep for an extra few minutes if I didn’t have a class beforehand, or stay back to ask my teacher a question, or chat with a friend on the paths, or get to my next class early, complain about the homework, jitter about a test and chat with my classmates. It’s some down time for my brain to take a break.
No blocks exclusively in the morning or afternoon.
I think students and teachers alike dread three times during the day—the first block in the morning, the first block after lunch, and the last block of the day. During these times students usually feel fatigued and unmotivated, which is nightmarish at a school where proactiveness is central to Harkness learning. In our current schedule, E and F are always stuck in the awkward afternoon times. Let’s shake that up.
No Saturday classes (we had them last year!).
If we can fit a working spring curriculum into a 10-week trimester with free Wednesdays every other week (a total of 20 fewer classes), I think we can go through fall term without any Saturday classes. This is under the premise, of course, that the Academy would not cancel school for many a number of days (due to snow, nationwide politics, etc.).
Introduce specific blocks for private music lessons during the week.
Right now some music teachers who live off-campus are struggling to schedule times with the students. What if we added special music lessons/uni free blocks as an additional option for scheduling?
End the day later, with longer breaks built in.
You may have sensed that my proposed schedule requires that we have more time built into our school day. This was inspired by a conversation with a few friends. As Exonians, it is not surprising that we are constantly busy and overbooked. We can imagine an average value of ‘busy-ness.’ Those above the average value use their time more efficiently (and, yes, sometimes we cut corners—that’s why Harkness tables are round). Those below the average value may have fewer concrete obligations, but fill their time with additional work, conferences, meetings, here and there. Everyone ends up feeling that same average value of ‘busy-ness,’ though those with more work may feel more stressed out. So why don’t we extend the class days (push sports back—it’s not too dark outside in the fall anyway) and build in more concentrated universal frees? That might mean to you a nap, a catch-up on work, an Exonian interview, or just a little exercise.
And finally...please no more confusing letters.
This is a minor one. A humor article already addressed this. Why use random letters from the end of the alphabet and not the lowercase letters? My guess is that this may have to do with some of the organizational quirks of the course registration process. Nevertheless, I think it would be useful to change the lettering system once and for all so that new (and old!) students don’t get confused.
Blocks with a lowercase letter could be used only by classes that use the reserve. This means that you would have at least four of the same class every week, with at least 1 being the reserve. Blocks E and F have two reserves in one week—this may allow teachers of electives to plan for a curriculum that functions on a different workload “wavelength,” which should reduce the number of instances where students receive more than three major assignments on any given day.
Thus incorporating these suggestions, I propose a revised timetable here:
I hope that the administration will create a fall term schedule that allows Exonians the freedom, support, and time to engage in their classes and extracurriculars to the best of their abilities.
