As rumors about the block schedule for the 2026-2027 school year have spread over the past few weeks, students have been desperately piecing together bits of information, scrambling to make sense of it. Neither students nor parents were allowed to express their opinions before the proposal was presented to teachers.
The majority of students don’t feel positively about the block schedule, according to a survey conducted by The Union. As of Feb. 10, 87% of 843 students on the main campus who responded to the survey are not interested in taking a class at the Innovation Campus, and 53% of main campus student-respondents believe the block schedule will hurt learning and extracurricular activities.
We, The Union, believe students and families should have been given the opportunity to give input on the block schedule proposal before the vote, teachers should have been given more time, and the proposed schedule itself should be more conducive to the needs of the students, parents, and staff of MHS.
The minimal information students have about the block schedule comes from teachers, who fear sharing any information about the proposed schedule change that may dramatically change the lives of students.
The lack of transparency surrounding the block schedule is hypocritical. For a district that markets itself with the, “Culture of WE,” the failure to collaborate with everyone on a major change makes us wonder if that “WE” only includes the administrators and staff.
Even then, all teachers (aside from those on the Site Leadership Team) were given only two weeks from being introduced to the block schedule to voting on enacting it for the upcoming school year. This is not an adequate amount of time for teachers to make a fully informed decision on a change that will heavily impact their curriculum. If the vote passes, they will only have a few months to restructure classes.
Most classes will also lose significant instruction time — which will especially impact AP classes, since students must learn a set amount of content in preparation for AP exams.
In addition, there are several potential problems with the proposed block schedule plan. If students have a 1st-6th schedule, then they start school at 8:30 am and end over an hour earlier than students who have a 2nd-7th schedule on certain days (these days being Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday).
How will counselors and/or administration decide which students get which schedule? The needs of some students may be prioritized over the needs of others, but there is no objective way to weigh which are more important. These needs include after-school extracurriculars, like sports practices, which may end up being negatively affected by the later end time of the 2nd-7th period schedule.
Some teachers say that the block schedule had been marketed as a good change for students and staff, yet the administration lacks the data to back up their claims. The block schedule’s marketing is eerily similar to the Innovation Campus, which was proposed as a promising investment for students without incorporating student perspective. Since, just like the Innovation Campus, it was planned without their insight, we are extremely skeptical that the block schedule will turn out to be successful.
