To decrease stress during the end of the semester for both students and faculty, the end-of-term schedule will span from Jan. 19-28 with new tools to help students plan and advocate for their workload.

According to Assistant Principal Asra Ahmed, the decision to expand the typical one-week semester ending to two weeks was made by the Fall Implementation Team, a committee of faculty members and administrators responsible for planning distance learning.

“It felt like spreading it out across two weeks would create a better schedule for students and for faculty,” Ms. Ahmed said. “It was in response to the remote schedule and the situation that everyone has to manage right now.” 

Because synchronous classes meet twice a week, rather than four, the committee members sought to ensure enough time for students to complete their work.

“The two weeks that we’ve allotted for January are basically equivalent to what would have been one week in a normal schedule,” Ms. Ahmed said. 

Another goal was to relieve stress from students and faculty that comes at the end of a semester. 

“The hope is that not everybody has all of their last assessments or projects on that last day, and that they’d instead have four days of possibilities across two weeks,” Ms. Ahmed said. 

The administration is also providing students with an End of Term Plans list, a Google sheet where teachers have entered major assessments that are due during the final two weeks of the semester. If a student finds they are overwhelmed with more than two major assessments in one day, the administration can help make a request, Ms. Ahmed said.

“The idea there was that every student would have a chance to truly map out what is coming,” Ms. Ahmed said. “We wanted to try to be as thoughtful as possible.”