Almost every student’s favorite time of day is undoubtedly lunch, when everyone gets a chance to socialize, eat, and relax.
Sometimes it’s also students last chance to get schoolwork done for classes later that day. Teachers also use the lunch period to eat, but they are also often use the time to grade assignments, set up lessons and meet with students.
It’s a critically important time of day for the whole campus to recharge and get things done so that’s why we were all disappointed when we discovered that the lunch period was reduced by five minutes this year compared to the 2022-2023 school year. It is especially difficult to take the cut in time because in 2021-2022 school year, the lunch period was a full 45 minutes and then there was a five minute passing period back to class.
This school year, the lunch period is 35 minutes with 5-minute passing periods after lunch ends at 11:45. We believe that this is not enough time for students to eat, relax and take care of their needs. The administration should give students more time by adding five minutes back to the lunch period and making some other tweaks that would allow for a six-minute passing period between most periods.
We believe that 35 minutes is too short of time, especially due to the long and chaotic lunch lines. Above all else, it doesn’t give students the rest time they need.
With Akins large student enrollment of more than 2,700 students, students need more time to traverse through the crowds of people to simply get lunch. It makes sense to feed that many people that you would need an adequate amount of time. However, as you go down to the cafeteria you can see the sea of people rushing in to avoid the long lines. On top of this, after getting into line, you can see the line getting longer and longer as you wait.
Lunch should be a time to socialize with your friends and take a break from the harsh and busy school schedule. However, because of to the shortening of lunch, we don’t have that opportunity. The time that they took from us last year was bad enough, but to do it again is just too much.
It truly has become a decision for students to decide if they want to get food or not. Even if they were to get food, some students find themselves not being able to eat without scarfing it down as fast as they can, while others are still in line when there are only 5 minutes left of lunch. The shortened lunch has caused lots of havoc among students, as well as teachers at Akins.
On the other hand, many jobs only allow for a 30-minute lunch and some 15 minute breaks. These brief lunches can help students understand how the job setting works.
Administrators have said shorter periods can prevent conflicts and fights between students, and that 40 minutes is enough time to socialize and take a break.
While learning how to manage the brief time, we also get longer classes. All of our other periods are one hour and 30-minutes long, but the 6th and 2nd periods — which occur opposite the A and B lunches — are now 1 hour and 35 minutes. This can help teachers give full instructions, knowing they have an extra 5 minutes, or it can help students get another 5 minutes on quizzes or assessments. That said, we believe that the advantages of a longer lunch period outweigh the need for adding five minutes to 2nd and 6th Period classes.
If we want to fix the short lunch problem, we should make lunch longer. Last year’s schedule was fine, no one complained about taking away 5 minutes from their classes from the year before. However, the school administration has made a mistake by reducing our true lunch period to 35 minutes.
There is no true benefit to shortening our lunches all it does is increase stress among students and not allow them to truly enjoy their time off. The same can be said about teachers. When comparing schools like Bowie or Crocket bell schedules, they have 40-minute lunch periods. In addition, Bowie has 6-minute passing periods. This is the schedule that Akins deserves — what Akins students and staff deserve. This will aid in other problems around the school, giving more time for everyone to eat, work, and socialize.
And adding one additional minute to the passing periods will help students who often have to travel far distances across campus to make it from one class to the next. It should also reduce the number of students who are tardy and thus reduce the amount of tension between students, teachers and administrators.
We believe that students and teachers deserve those five minutes back. Our lunch period is meant to be used as a break or a planning period for teachers. This helps us all have enough energy to go on with our day. Students and teachers should have their own time to relax and destress from all of the school work. The Akins administration should give us our five minutes back to allow everyone to enjoy school. School is supposed to set students up for success, and having our lunch brake helps us maintain a stable school life environment.
