In every school across the country, students come late to class. Why does it happen at TABC? Sometimes it’s because students aren’t moving fast enough. But does it sometimes happen because there’s simply not enough time between periods for students to get where they need to be?
If the second of these options is true, finding a solution won’t be an easy task, since it’s bound to affect the schedule, not to mention teachers and students who have no difficulties making it to class on time.
It’s very important that students have an appropriate amount of time between periods so they can go to the bathroom (if necessary), get something from their locker, or traverse all the way across a very long building.
Our schedule currently allots 4 minutes for this. Is that enough time?
Senior Noah Gluck says he doesn’t have an issue this year with tardiness. Gluck feels that four minutes is enough time to get from one class to another in terms of distance, but it isn’t enough time to do other things to prepare for class, such as using the bathroom.
Gluck noted that one year he had two successive classes that were across the building from one another. This did create an issue for him..
When I asked Junior Efraim Ginsberg whether he arrives late because his classes are spaced very far apart, he simply said, “No, because my locker is well placed [in the building].” Ginsberg pointed out he does not have an issue with the bathroom either, since he is usually able to use it during other classes.
History teacher Jeremy Ginsburg (unrelated to Efraim Ginsberg) said that typically 5-10% of his students show up late to class. Science teacher Ayelet Kopel and Navi teacher Rabbi Howard Jachter agreed with Ginsburg, reporting that they found the same percentage of students come late to their class.
Their experiences differ, however, when it comes to how late students show up. Jachter said his students usually show up only a minute or two late, while Kopel and Ginsburg both said that their students come about 5-10 minutes late.
Some teachers are strict about attendance, while others are more lax. Jachter said he prefers to teach from the very beginning of the period to the end. “I’m paid to teach 40 minutes, so I’m going to teach 40 minutes,” said Jachter.
Kopel and Ginsburg agreed with Jachter about this as well. Ginsburg noted that he would like to teach “bell to bell”, but students wasting time in the beginning of class often prevent him from doing so.
It is evident from these interviews that a teacher’s strictness when marking attendance plays a factor in lateness. Jachter’s students are marked late for arriving just one minute after the bell, while Ginsburg’s and Kopel’s students are only marked late after about five minutes.
General Studies Principal Arthur Poleyeff views lateness as a “moderate issue” in the school. Poleyoff does understand the issue of students moving across the building, and agrees that it is “not their fault” if they’re coming late to class. When asked what he would propose as a solution to the problem, he simply stated, “Get to class on time.”
When asked how he would solve the issue, Gluck said he would enforce the idea that teachers must let students leave class the moment the bell rings. Ginsberg and Junior Avraham Glatter both posed their own solutions, which was to use a minute or two of class time for break time between periods instead.
Teachers and administrators offered different approaches. As mentioned above, Poleyeff’s solution was to simply “Get to class on time.” Jachter had the same kind of simple approach, suggesting that everyone in the school “rise up” and “raise the standards”.
Kopel had a similar idea, which was for teachers to be stricter on marking students late. “They would be more motivated to come to class on time,” said Kopel. Ginsburg, on the other hand, didn’t think that the problem resided in lateness at all; rather, the issue was the class not being able to settle down right away.
This brings us to how I think the problem of lateness should be solved. I proposed a solution of simply cutting off the last two minutes of each class, bringing each period down to thirty eight minutes.This would leave a six minute break in between.
When I asked the students how they felt about this solution, their opinions were similar. Gluck felt that the idea “could potentially work”, and that the extra two minutes could definitely help sme students.
Ginsberg and Glatter had similar opinion; each of them felt the two minutes could help students come on time. Glatter noted that he thought five minutes would be a little better, since keeping track of time in multiples of five is easier.
Gluck said, “I think one problem could be that if teachers see we have six minutes instead of four minutes in between each period, they might actually be more likely to keep students after the bell.”
Ginsberg had a different opinion, which was the idea that six minutes might “interrupt the flow of learning”. Glatter didn’t have much of a problem with the solution; the only thing he had to say was, “I would prefer five minutes, but I like the idea overall. Both are better than the current situation.”
The administration, however, felt differently. When asked about adding two minutes between periods, Poleyoff simply said, “the two minutes are significant” enough that they could not be cut off.
The teachers I interviewed did not like the idea either. Ginsburg, for one, said, “Periods are too short. Even two minutes are significant, and it wouldn’t help since students are already coming significantly late.”
Jachter agreed with Ginsburg about the two minutes. “The two minutes are very important”, he said.
Kopel also thought that the two minutes would not help, but for a different reason. “The culture of the school wouldn’t handle it well, and the students would just spend an extra two minutes on phones,” said Kopel.
Another aspect of lateness is the bathroom policy. Students are not permitted to leave the classroom unless there’s an emergency. Because of this, students must use the bathroom between classes, which they don’t always have enough time to do, especially if they also have to walk across the building to get to their next class.
“If you factor in all the things you need, like bathroom or stopping at your locker, then I don’t think there’s enough time in between classes,” Gluck said.
Ginsberg agreed. “The only reason I’m not late is because I use the bathroom during class. I would be late if Rabbi Adler’s bathroom policy was enforced,” said Ginsberg. Glatter only finds it an issue if it’s a combination of going across the building and using the bathroom.
Of course, none of this is an issue now that our school is on lockdown due to the Coronavirus. Our schedule was changed from forty minute periods with a four minute break to half-hour classes with a ten minute break. This was a dramatic shift and had a severe effect on lateness.
Kopel said that there are positives and negatives to the online Zoom classes. “The ten minutes is necessary because it gives a chance for the students to relax, as well as giving teachers time to set up their next class or answer questions from previous classes,” she said.
Kopel also pointed out that students are more likely to use the break time properly. “There is also no problem with giving students an extended break, since they don’t have [the same kind of] social interaction that would normally distract them from getting on time to class.”
On the other hand, Kopel said, “It’s hard to get anything done in half an hour,” since it’s not really enough time to teach a whole class. Teachers were upset about losing even two minutes of class time; Kal V’Chomer, ten minutes is much worse.
The students had mixed opinions about the new schedule. “I actually think the ten minutes is a pretty good thing because it pretty much guarantees no one will be late,” Gluck said.
Ginsberg disagreed. “The ten minute break is too much honestly, especially when all you need to do is click on a link to get to another class.” Ginsberg also pointed out that a student “doesn’t need to go to his locker if his bag is right next to him”. Glatter had a similar opinion: “I don’t really mind it, and actually I think it might be too long.”
In conclusion, the solution of adding two minutes to the break seemed to be liked by the students, but teachers and administration did not think the same. Conversely, teachers tended to like the ten minute break, while some students found issues with it. Is having shorter periods and longer breaks a good idea? You decide.