In the fall and winter of the 2009-2010 school year, a vague, unknown concept lurked around the Upper School hallways.This concept: trimesters.What was this obscure idea of dividing the school year into three sections instead of two?Why was this idea even coming up?Who came up with it?How did the process to come to a decision work?Many students wanted, and still want to know the answers to these questions and more.My friends, I am here to tell you and expose the truth behind trimesters.
It all started last spring, when Brian Yager was sent on a quest to create a flexible program for those wishing to take summer school.He found that “it was logistically impossible” to offer a full semester course in the summer—there just wasn’t enough time!In this quest for a flexible program, the concept of trimesters was offered up as a solution to ways to “structure the year, lighten the workload, and create more opportunities for classes.”
In November Brian took the idea to the Upper School Faculty and in December, they decided to look into the “idea in more depth and take it to the students.”Now, this is where things become a little bit cloudy between the administration and the students.According to Brian, the idea was presented “to the Student Senate in January” and there were a couple class meetings where the Senators had the opportunity to bring the idea forward.Apparently, there was one class meeting where the subject of trimesters was on the list of topics to talk about, however, some classes only talked about the environmental mission statement with the students from Environmental Science.Because of this conflict, there has been much confusion amongst the students.
People didn’t really know what was going on and where we were in the process.Were we close to making a decision?Would the decision affect next year, or the year after that?I traveled around the halls of the Upper School to gather a general census on how people feel about the idea and they way the perceived how process worked.When I took my questions to primarily the underclassmen (as they will be the most affected by the switch), I received a wide range of opinions.When I interviewed Morgan Atkinson, an avid cross country skier who tends to miss a bit of school in the winter months, said, “I like having a longer semester to make up my grades (from missing school)” and her fear is that with trimesters she will not have enough time.Many of the sophomores also felt as if they were left in the dark.According to Eric Runkel, “we didn’t know anything that was going on,” and Isobel Pollock jumped in by saying that “besides the five minutes in class meetings, we never really heard about it.”At this point in the conversation, Morgan also said, “I feel like by the time they brought up trimesters, a decision was already made and our discussions weren’t going to do anything about it.”Many of the sophomores nodded their heads in agreement.
Next, I traveled down the hall to the freshman hang out area where I found Calder Zarkos, Timo Gould and Lolo Shipley.When I asked them what they thought about the switch, Timo said that he was “not feeling it” and Lolo added in by saying, “It’s okay, but if I have three sets of finals I will freak!”When I asked Calder what he thought of the process, he replied, “I feel that it was kind of kept private, even though they came to us at advisor, but they didn’t sit us down and explain the changes and how it was going to work—they just did it.”Although these boys weren’t sure that there even was a process and at were, at times, a little distracted, they still agreed that there wasn’t much of a process where student voices could be not only heard, but also considered in the decision-making process.
Through my interviews with students, there were mixed reviews about whether or not the switch was good or bad, but the reviews about the process were pretty clear across the board.Students have felt that there hasn’t been much discussion about the topic and when there was, there was always something else going on and the issue of trimesters wasn’t on the forefront of discussion.This change happened so fast—from the beginning of the school year, to mid-school year—that there almost wasn’t even much time to talk and really take it into consideration.There was a little sense that we should wait to get the ball rolling, but after Brian consulted with Andy, they “both decided to get it going and not over-plan.” Based on the student input, it is clear that we broke down when it was time to communicate.Regardless, the change is still happening.So, how can we improve?
Next time, lets involve the students more.This is the Community School and we stress the importance that students have a voice in this school. This was a good learning experience, and even if the decisions made in the future don’t agree with the students’ opinions, they will know that their voice was heard, and they had had a part in the process.
By: Audrey Kirk