2 SIDES TO A NEW SCHEDULE

by Malia Gaviola, Editor-in-Chief

The complaints piled high as the school year has rolled out. Third period students in the east campus were sent to early Lunch

A. West campus students headed to fourth period, launched afterwards, and the whole day started 30 minutes later than any year in anyone’s history. It was a recipe for perfect grumbling, and a logical result of available resources and Senate laws.

Students of course were quick to state the issues they disliked about the lunch: separations from friends and routines. In an Oct. 5 survey of 354 students, 65.5% of students stood against the split lunches and speak openly of the social costs.

“It causes a multitude of inconveniences for students i.e. not being able to meet with teachers during lunch, most clubs not being able to have meetings during lunch, not being able to sit with friends. I think it’s causing more trouble than it’s worth,” a sophomore said, encapsulating most of the student issues with the schedule.

“I never see my friends and it makes me feel so lonely and left out when half of my friends have a different lunch period,” the junior said. “If the friends I have in my lunch period are absent, I have to sit alone in the library at lunch. And it sucks. Lunches are so bad when you don’t have any friends to hangout with.”

Assistant Principal Michael Godsey maintained that the two lunches were enacted because PRHS has over 2,000 students enrolled and that is a staggering number to oversee at one time.

I’m sure there are other little reasons [why we should have split lunches], but the main one, the real one, is safety,” Godsey said. “There’s just so many kids at this huge high school. If there was a big safety situation that we want to make sure that we have enough security to handle it.”

Only 15% of students have been able to see the bright side of the smaller lunches as they wrote because there are less people, it is less crowded, more places to sit, shorter lunch lines, have plagued the campus since 2019. Moreover, the first day of school is associated with waking up “early” for the first time since summer started. Yet on Jan. 1, 2020 Senate Bill 328 prohibited high school instruction from beginning until after 8:30 a.m.--zero period excluded.

A “Back to School” survey Oct. 5, 59.8% of students were “for” the 8:30 start.

“ I think it really helps students who live far away get a chance to sleep in a little later and have a somewhat better mental health,” said a sophomore

On the other hand, 19.5% were against the late start, citing a later start leads to a plethora of consequences .

“I always come home later now after school because of practice, which means that I start homework late and I end up staying up late,” a junior said.

Yet, changing the start time of the high school was the least of the changes in the schedule: the most infamous of all, split lunches split the student body to PRHS.

Despite 50.1% of surveyed students stating that they know the rationale behind the lunch policy in a free response section where they could write the reason, many students stated that it was to reduce the spread of COVID-19.

Godsey sympathized with students struggling in this time. He acknowledged the fact that students are disgruntled with not being able to see their peers and that they should look ahead.

“What advice would I give is that this is a new opportunity to make new friends and meet new groups to get outside your circle a little bit,” Godsey said. “I encourage them [students struggling] to see their friends at nutrition, within their own classes, and that there’s a whole lifetime of after school and on weekends. Now it’s all the more exciting to see them at dances or other school activities.”

For or against 8:30 am start

QUotes From sUrveY

Because of the split lunches, I don’t get to catch up with a lot of my friends. Also, it makes it a lot harder to meet with teachers during my lunch time because they are teaching during that time.

Less students at lunch means lower wait times for food and fewer students to supervise.

-TEACHER

It’s always better to have a less crowded campus and it feels more peaceful.

19.5% 20.7%

59.8% For or against split lUnches

15%

19.5%

FOR N E U TRAL

65.4%

AGAINST NEUTR A L FOR AGAIN S T