COLBY QUALLS – Hoof Prints Editor
Over the past four years, there have been a total of three time changes in the BIC schedule. This school year, many students have been surprised with the recent time schedule change. A recurring thought among some of them was that a new school year has enough changes without a whole new schedule.
Last year’s schedule was eight periods, each 45 minutes long with school starting at 8:05 a.m. This schedule has each day starting at 8:00 a.m., and instead of eight periods of equal length, the last two periods are 50 minutes long. The other 5 minutes are accounted for by lunch being 5 minutes shorter.
The schedule change was necessary since the school has a distance learning center. The DLC dictates windows of time for the school’s bell schedule. This year, seventh hour Spanish had to start at 1:30 p.m. Since last year’s schedule couldn’t accommodate for this time change, a new schedule was created.
Mr. Randy Rose, principal, said he isn’t a fan of this change himself. He considered a total of twelve different scenarios each with adjustable lunch times. There was only one solution he saw in which to keep the lunch period with the normal amount of allotted time.
“The only way we could have kept the lunch period the same would be to stay at school past 3:15,” Mr. Rose said. “Many schools already do this, but I personally do not wish to extend that time.”
Even though Mr. Rose was not enthusiastic about this change, he has pointed out some positive effects. The state department requires each school to have at least 360 minutes of instruction each day. This new schedule allows a total of 370 minutes of instruction per day. “The students are now a total of 10 minutes smarter each day,” Mr. Rose said.
Mr. Rose believes that the schedule won’t be a nuisance for much longer. He alluded that within a few weeks that this schedule will seem routine and normal. “Give it a chance, you will get used to it,” Mr. Rose said.
Other students didn’t share the same sentiments as their principal. Rebecka Bowen, junior, expressed how much she disliked the change. “I just don’t like it,” Becka said a total of five times. “By the time we get to lunchroom, and sit down, we only have 10 minutes to eat lunch,” Bowen added. “I don’t know about everyone else, but I have to scarf down my food, shoot!”
A few students weren’t really bothered at all by the change. Shelby Qualls, senior, mentioned that the change wasn’t even that noticeable. She didn’t like her lunch hour being shortened, but at the same time, it really wasn’t much of a bother to her. This casual attitude included getting up earlier. “Everyone is up anyway, why not just come on in?” Shelby said.
One student even proposed a solution to this. Savannah Reed, senior, knew that the change of schedule resulted from the DLC’s time frame. She suggested that we drop the DLC classes and hire our own teachers in place. “We only have a few classes that are through the DLC,” Savannah said. “Why don’t we just hire our own Spanish and college algebra teachers?”
Many people have had different opinions about the schedule change. Even though these opinions were varied, all of them accepted this change for the year. “We have to keep this (current schedule) until the DLC says otherwise,” Mr. Rose said.
