Will the Following Students Please Report to Guidance…

Will the Following Students Please Report to Guidance...

Kirti Nath, Staff Writer

With a new school year in full swing, many students can’t help but look back on what seems like a whirlwind of scheduling issues and guidance visits. Due to recent budget cuts that have been affecting so many areas of school life, such as extra-curricular activities and class sizes, creating a personalized schedule that suited both the student’s and school’s needs seemed more difficult than ever this year.

New caps have been placed on the size limit of classes, allowing fewer to get seats and limits flexibility in making arrangements. From the first day of the school this year students filed into a bustling guidance office to fill out slips with their requests. Soon after, they were contacted with a new schedule or had to make a meeting with their counselor. Counselors and secretaries worked with a great deal of students through the first weeks of school. Swati Gupta, a senior, stated that she visited guidance about four times in the beginning of the school year to work on her schedule with her counselor. She stated, “that this was definitely her most difficult year of schedule changes in my three years at Melville.” Shannon Sartain, a sophomore, states that “because students have a minimal understanding of how class caps work it can be frustrating”. However she states that she understands “the level of the situation the school is facing.” Both students eventually were able to change their schedules, but had to take either second choice courses or drop a class they were happy with. Some students also feel that scheduling issues this year may pose issues in later years with course load and electives requests.

Now well into the school year, guidance is still trying to speak with students. Many are still switching into and out of classes, but things are visibly starting to settle down. Having the right amount of free periods, courses, and electives in a schedule is important to all high school students.

Ward Melville was faced with a difficult year in terms of making students’ schedules suited to both their personal abilities and desires. Now, schedule corrections, a process that used to be majorly completed during one hot day in August, has filtered into the first weeks of the year as students drop classes and other students fill their seats. The Ward Melville community worked hard to accommodate the many students who sought aid in fixing their schedule. It was a difficult period, but now many students are settled in, and happy with the new academic school year.