New daily schedule causes concern, benefits for many

Paige Napholz, Contributing Writer

For the 2017-2018 school year and years to come, District 214 decided to make changes to the daily schedules of students and teachers.

At Elk Grove specifically, instead of school starting at 8:10a.m. it starts at 8:15 a.m. and ending at 3:10 p.m. instead of 3:30 p.m.

Along with that initial time change, District 214 decided to remove late starts from Thursday mornings and shorten class periods to 48 minutes and passing periods to four minutes.

Some hoped that the district by enforcing this new time change was to “ensure balance, and mental, physical and emotional well-being” as superintendent David Schuler expressed in an article from the Chicago Tribune.

Yet, my outlook on the situation is that pushing the start of school back by 5 minutes is not going to affect the amount of sleep a student gets.

Personally, I wake up and leave my house at the same time as I did when school started at 8:10. As for teachers, they have to arrive at school at 7:15 a.m. instead of 7:45a.m.

English teacher Jessica Maciejewski likes this change because she “avoids traffic” since she is coming from the city and it always gives her “more time to prepare” for her classes for the rest of the day.

English teacher, Emily Mikuzis, also likes the start time. “I like the fact the I have an hour before the day starts” and she likes having “time to plan,” Mikuzis said.

Also, with the removal of late start, which was utilized by many students such as me to catch on sleep or get extra work time for assignments, it takes away the one day that students would have to rest for the duration of the week.

Yet, teachers on the other hand, never benefited from late start. Maciejewski believes that the removal of late starts is good for students because it no longer “throws students off to have a weird short day.”

Another change to the schedule is shortened class periods to 48 minutes, and the switch from five minutes to four minute passing periods.

From a student perspective, the shortened class periods didn’t seem to make that big of a deal, yet teachers think that “it really does seem short and rushed,” Mikuzis said  she “can feel the difference” in the shortened periods and “always want[s] more time with my  students.”

As for passing periods, from a student perspective, they are one of the few times during the school day where our brains get to rest and students get to relax before heading to class.

With the passing periods at four minutes, it “seems like no big deal, but actually cuts off a lot of time”junior Anna Sprenger said. 

Overall, the new schedule change is an adjustment that many people, including myself, are still trying to get used to.

It will take some time to see if this new schedule helps to lower stress and make students more productive, yet in my opinion I think the schedule is very beneficial, but it has it’s downfalls as well.