Time between classes can allow more activities and socializing

hour classes will not begin during the 2:30 p.m. block, but four, five and six hour classes can still take place.

scheduled. This allows students and faculty to attend club meetings and office hours.

The college hour may seem like a foreign thought at Pierce, but Los Angeles Valley College currently has a time slot that allows for campus activities and club events.

With the implementation of a semblance of the college hour starting in the fall, Pierce may be heading in that direction.

Vice President of Administrative Services Sheri Berger said that three-

“I suppose for fall we will have a quasi, unofficial college hour because there aren’t as many classes scheduled at that time frame,” Berger said.

A champion of the college hour, Vice President of Student Services Earic Dixon-Peters brought the idea to Pierce a few years ago after seeing it successfully implemented at other colleges. College hour is a block in the day when little to no classes are

“The typical intent and purpose of it is to provide an opportunity where the campus community can come together to do a few things: to learn and engage and explore together different topics, ideas through activities and workshops,” DixonPeters said. “It also gives faculty a chance to engage with students beyond the classroom at a particular hour at a particular time to have robust learning opportunities.”

Berger said that when she came to Pierce College in September 2014, there was a conversation to implement a college hour, but administration decided not change the scheduled class times.

It wasn’t until January this year that they again began talking about the possibility of an hour block.

Berger said she became aware of some issues that needed to be solved within those scheduling blocks, which were unrelated to the college hour. She presented the conflict to the department chairs’ taskforce, and proposed a solution that would remove three-hour classes from the 2:30 p.m. block, effectively giving more students and teachers free time.

“Not everything always fits nicely into this grid,” Berger said. “The task force decided to see if they could incorporate a college hour because they were going to be relooking at the grid anyway.”

Different approaches to the hour are being considered by faculty and administration to avoid a schedule block with conflicts.

Professor of psychology and statistics Jennifer Moses said a schedule was initiated by administration, and the department chairs created a task force to respond to the suggestions.

“Scheduling is a very complicated thing. Because there are different departments that have different class lengths, you want to create blocks of time so that classes don’t overlap,” Moses said. “If there’s even a minute of overlap between two classes, students can’t take those two classes.”

[see HOUR on pg. 3]

Community colleges often act as a stepping stone for students to transfer to four year universities. For many non-traditional or returning students, community college serves as a tool for acquiring more professional or technical skills they may need to advance in their existing jobs.

Students who need to balance work and family life with school, may need to take most, if not all, of their classes at night.

Pierce should have more resources and create a stronger community for those students.

Night students don’t receive the same basic needs traditional

Column: Fighting Depression

By Jordan Nathan

Depression can be found in onein-five students and is a reason why they seek counseling, according to the Center for Collegiate Mental Health.

Depression is the number one cause of suicide, according to psychologytoday.com. It is also one of many mental health issues that can affect any student regardless of how long they have been in college.

When students attend college they tend to go through challenges that they did not face at any other time in their school experiences. These issues can be both exciting and frightening.

Transitioning from high school to a college or university can be the first time a student has felt alone and/ or away from home. Meeting new people, developing relationships, new living environments, financial troubles and new living situations can cause students a lot of anxiety.

Learning to handle these challenges is fundamental and can help keep students healthy and avoid going over the edge. Depression can be overcome if there is a balance. No one can get better if they go it alone. Help is always available on and off campus.

students get because many offices close before, or soon after the start of evening classes.

Special Services closes at 4:30 p.m., the Counseling and Health centers close at 7 p.m. and the Library / Learning Crossroads closes at 8:30 p.m. If students needed access to any of these services during class, it would be close to impossible.

If food is desired before classes or during a break, students don’t have much time to stop at the Brahma Cafe, which closes at 7:15 p.m., or the Food Court, which closes at 8 p.m.

Also some students may not be able to meet with a professor during office hours or get tutoring help, which makes it difficult to achieve a higher grade.

A possible solution may be offering more online resources, such as counseling and tutoring, according to the Education Commission of the States (ecs.org).

The website also reports schools can provide non-traditional students with degree outlines (roadmaps) that may help them complete their courses within the time they need.

Some students that take night classes may never have the opportunity to take one during the day. Shouldn’t they have the option to obtain a degree with only online or night courses?

While the college hour is being