PODs when?

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Rumors have been flying around the halls of Jim Thorpe Area High School about PODs period moving to the middle of the day next year. The rumors are true; however, PODs will be different than what students are used to now. PODs is being revamped for the fresh new year. Mr. Lesisko told The Olympiad staff all about the new plan.

 

A rotating PODs schedule is the simplest way to describe it. Currently, students can take electives to explore their interests, but now, the new PODs will allow them to broaden their world even more. The period block of time will be devoted to the exploration of interests, building skills, sharing interests with peers and teachers, and developing a tighter student teacher relation. The PODs period will be spent in a specific class devoted to exploring certain interests. The word class might bring the thought of homework and assignments, but this is not the case. These will not be traditional classes taught with notes on the board. This PODs period is meant to give a break to the students in the middle of the day. The teachers and students can share discussions in similar topics together to broaden their discovery.

 

Where does the “rotation” come into play? The entire system will run off a six day scheduling cycle. Every day the student would go to a different location. After the sixth day, the cycle restarts, and the student returns to their original location. For example, say a student starts the cycle in a specific interest, such as art appreciation, on Monday. After the six day cycle, that same student would go back to art appreciation on Tuesday the following week.

 

As some students may know, specific courses currently offered utilize PODs as a time to work. Mr. Eichelberger’s Biology Seminar, as it would be known as next year, has been known to utilize PODs as a time to begin labs. Higher level Spanish classes do not even have a class. They utilize PODs to meet and teach while the students have free time. These arrangements are not entirely gone. For people taking these special case classes, a spot in the rotation will be given to the class.

 

What do the students of JTHS have to say about this?

 

An anonymous Junior girl spoke her mind. “I can’t think of a single good thing this is going to bring. I currently use PODs to finish any homework I had not completed the night before. The school assumes that students have time to do excessive homework at home and don’t understand the things that could be going on at home. The amount of students falling asleep in class would increase tenfold and have the potential to lower GPA.

 

She is not the only one to state these arguments.

 

“I, personally, don’t think it’s a good idea because this is a time to be studying and working. Students use this time because they can’t do it at home or after sports. I don’t think it’s going to work the way they think it will,” an anonymous Junior boy stated.

 

Although it would have its benefits for building student teacher bonds, the drop in GPAs might be inevitable. Upon further research, it has been found that these are not unpopular concerns and opinions. The students have spoken.

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