UPDATE: The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board of Education choose to push a vote on potentially changing the high school schedules to its meeting on June 20.
The Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board of Education will consider a major change to its high school schedules at its meeting Thursday night. After months of assessment and discussion among administrators, a focus group of students, and community members, the district is weighing whether to adopt a block schedule format instead of its current seven-period day.
The High School Schedule Assessment project began after Carrboro High School officials approached CHCCS a few years ago about trying to better align the four high schools’ schedules. Currently, Carrboro operates in a seven-period day with alternating A/B days to allow flexibility while Phoenix Academy is on a 4×4 block schedule and both Chapel Hill and East Chapel Hill high schools have a traditional seven-period schedule.
The request led to a larger discussion about how to best optimize the high school schedule for the widest range of opportunities, according to CHCCS’ Deputy Superintendent Rodney Trice. During a May 2 school board work session, Trice said after amassing a 23-person guidance committee of volunteers, district leaders realized that students are “enduring” the seven-period schedule more so than thriving in it.
“They talked about how the heavy course loads, carrying seven or eight classes a day for the entire academic year was very demanding,” says the deputy superintendent. “It impacted their school-life balance in terms of participating in extra-curricular activities, taking care of family members, that kind of thing.”
Bob Bales – who leads curriculum and instruction for secondary education in the district – is also a leader in the schedule assessment project. He says it’s clear that while the seven-period setup works well for some students, it creates scheduling problems for others. That includes students in CHCCS’ Newcomers Program, who need additional credit hours to learn English or may be getting a late start in high school, and ones who lack either time or resources to keep up with homework loads outside of school.
“What we have right now, it places a real stress for them,” says Bales. “Not necessarily having a [dedicated] time to just stop, take a breath, and do some of the work they’ve got to do. I think a lot of it is just the fact that this is what we’ve done for so long – and change is hard, change is different.”
The change being proposed is to move to a form of block scheduling, where the base of a student’s schedule would be four classes for the fall and a different four classes in the spring. Out of the dozen schedule options the project team examined, it best strikes the balance of offering more opportunities while promoting student wellness tactics, according to Trice. The CHCCS Board of Education could ultimately determine what kind of 4×4 block schedule is best – one with rotating schedules, one with flexible periods, one where lunch is split into tutoring periods – or to remain with a seven-period slate.
A view of the Chapel Hill High School tiger mural seen from the center of the courtyard.
Trice points to an aligned block schedule not only allowing more students to take classes only offered at one of the four high schools, but easier time frames to take community college classes as well. He says 40 percent of the 22-23 graduating class either enrolled in community colleges or didn’t enter higher education at all. The deputy superintendent says he believes offering more chances to go to community college classes and earn credit in high school could significantly decrease that rate – and would go hand-in-hand with helping improve student wellness.
“Building out pathways,” Trice says, “where students can explore and also receive college credit, and perhaps even a degree or certificate before they leave high school, says a lot [to me] about encouraging students to attend school, motivating students to attend school. Because ‘opportunity’ also speaks to how well I feel like my school or my district is serving me [as a student.]”
The seven-period schedule has its supporters, though. Nearly all of the speakers during the 90 minutes of public comment on May 2 shared concerns about a potential block schedule. Some Chapel Hill and East Chapel Hill students and parents pointed to how it does not align with AP testing schedules if courses are taught in the fall, while others raised questions about the viability of taking arts or language studies courses if students take months off from the subject. Additionally, some high schoolers said they were concerned about the workloads if they missed time in class and others worried about their attention spans lasting through an 80-minute class period instead of approximately 45-60 minutes.
Public commenters and board members also shared concerns from teacher perspectives, saying educators will have to adjust styles, curriculum, and stamina if longer class periods are adopted. Trice says the district plans to provide professional development and ample resources to teachers with those worries – and adds that they would be heavily involved in any sort of schedule planning.
“I fully expect after Thursday, if the board makes a decision,” says Trice, “the amount of collaboration will go up – not down. To successfully implement the change, we’re going to need the expertise of science teachers, arts teachers, foreign language teachers, CTE teachers. They’re going to be integral to the decision-making process.”
During the May 2 work session, several board members shared comments both for and against moving away from the current daily high school schedule. If the elected officials do move ahead with any change to classes, the new style would take effect in the 2025-26 academic year at the earliest.
The CHCCS school board meeting on Thursday is expected to start open session a little earlier than usual at 6:30 p.m., with public comment beginning shortly afterward.
Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Superintendent Nyah Hamlett (left) stands with the 2024-25 Board of Education for a portrait following its organization meeting in December. (Photo via CHCCS.)
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Here is the link of the school board meeting (https://chccs.granicus.com/player/clip/640?view_id=2&redirect=true). A majority of community (teachers, students, and parents) oppose this type of block scheduling the board is proposing. It would be nice if Chapelboro.com did an article of those who oppose and and those who agree with this…please not the board members.