Widespread Outrage Over Changes in Lunch Schedules & The Reasoning Behind it

The rumbling stomachs, loud growls, and the heads resting on tables in my 5th period class can no longer be ignored and have seemingly become the new normal for 2nd semester. Whether you have been affected by this new semester change or not, you likely know someone who has and is probably angry about the changes. But does anyone know why the lunch schedule change occurred in the first place?

WHAT HAPPENED:

My 5th period class is history on the third floor, which, for most of the year, meant that I had A lunch. But this semester, the 300 and 100 floors swapped places, giving me, along with many other students, B lunch instead. Along with this drastic change, Thursday has adopted a similar schedule to Wednesday’s block, meaning that 5th period has been split into two 45 minute sections for students now with B lunch. 

THE REACTIONS:

From asking around, student to student, teacher to teacher, the consensus is quite clear that people are outraged. A few students, including myself, agree that their daily clocks and routines have been messed up immensely by this simple 50 minute change. The main issue is hunger. We have been in school for about 5 months, and everyone has certainly committed to a routine. But poof, suddenly that routine has changed, and at a critical time like the start of a new semester, adapting becomes a big issue.

When I asked students whose lunch schedules had been changed what their opinions were, these were some of the responses: 

 “It feels like I have to just eat already because there’s no other time I can. And it messes up the flow of the day.”

“It ruined my lunch because now I can’t do any work, I’m eating later, it messed up my metabolism, I’m more tired throughout the day, and I really hate it because I was so used to it.”

“Everything was fine beforehand.”

It is also important to consider that the 300 floor is basically the math and history departments. These classes, as students are well accustomed to, require intense focus, problem solving, and analysis. All of which students are now having to do without a break in between. Having that 30 minute lunch beforehand is crucial to focusing in these types of classes, and without Im sure its consequences will soon follow.

The second concern was friend groups being divided. Honestly, the best part of lunch isn’t the orange chicken, it’s the little time we can spend with our friends that aren’t casual waves in the hallways. Sure, it takes time to secure your group, but once you have that group its there for you the whole year, or so students thought. One student reported their 12 person friend group got cut down to 3 due to the change, and I’m sure other people are experiencing similar issues. Overall, people just aren’t happy with these changes and are asking who approved this and why? I believe I have been able to understand the reasoning behind this.

THE REASONING:

There had to have been some sort of reasoning behind this mid-year change, right? Yes, there is, and I’ll let you decide if it was justified or not. It all starts with OSPI(Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction), which sets the guidelines for all Washington schools, including our district. To basically summarize a long list of hard to find guidelines, Lunch needs to start before 1 pm and be at least 20 minutes(on a side note, apparently some other WA schools are falling short of this 20 minute mark, which is kind of ridiculous). Our previous Thursday block schedule did not accomplish this, as it started after 5th period(for students with B lunch), a little after 1 pm, hence why the only option was to seemingly split 5th period in half to accommodate this regulation that the school suddenly wants to meet. 

But why the 100 and 300 swap? The 100 floor is mainly the science department, as we may know, and often the science department utilizes block days for long labs, which often require a variety of chemicals, or cool machines you need to leave on for a while if you were in AP chem. If you had a 5th period science class and you had a lab, that lab would then be split up into two parts, posing a potentially unsupervised space with open chemicals and waste. This is why the 100 and 300 floors swapped places. So that the science department could have the lab days, one of which they were already giving up on the Wednesday block.

Another question that came up when interviewing people about their positions on this was that it has something to do with paying the lunch staff. I asked a lunchlady if they were affected by this change, and she said no, not really, but when interviewing one of the VPs, it was mentioned that the after 1 pm lunch start resulted in overtime pay. The answer to this specific question is unclear, but let’s still continue to show our appreciation for the lunch staff!

Now, I suppose that does make sense, giving the science department lab days, but what about the tests we have in essentially every other class? When talking to a vice principal, I was assured that these decisions have many layers to them, and the intentions are never to directly harm the students. I believe that, of course, this is true, but were there better ways to go about it instead of simply uprooting schedules? As a junior myself, that 30 minute break before history was bliss; I could just rest after having 4 other core classes in a row, but now I worry that this change has come at the cost of many students and could potentially become a bigger issue that we are yet to see.

This is my first ever article. Please let me know what you think, if you have any questions Ill do my best to answer them. 

Thanks,

Kerys Peacock