High school drafts new schedule

DAVENPORT – After a survey of students indicated a majority preferred the idea, the high and middle school are leaning toward a new schedule style for the 2021-22 school year. A return to five days in person is on the horizon, with parents holding the option to have their children participate in online school instead.

While still in draft mode with details needing to be ironed out in August, the schedule would feature eight 35-minute periods on Mondays with students attending all their allotted classes, while Tuesday-Friday would have four 88-minute periods. Students would attend four of their classes Tuesdays and Thursdays, and their other classes Wednesdays and Fridays.

Mondays would continue to be the late start day, with the bell ringing at 8:55 a.m. instead of 7:55 a.m. like other days. High school principal Chad Prewitt said this is because most holidays, like Labor Day, Veteran’s Day and Martin Luther King Jr. Day, fall on Mondays.

By having Mondays be late starts with all eight periods, students will be missing their classes an equal amount of time when holidays fall. If late start eight-period days were on Fridays, students would be receiving their Wednesday/Friday classes less regularly than their Tuesday/Thursday classes due to the frequency of Monday holidays.

Any school days that need to be cancelled in-person for reasons such as smoke, COVID-19 outbreaks in schools or icy roads can still be moved remotely for a day or couple days, as the district became quite used to during the 2020-21 school year.

The sample schedule listed above is not finalized and still has details to be sorted out before the start of school, which is Aug. 31.