With the exception of seniors reveling in the end of their career as high school students, the closing of the school year is usually a stressful time for everyone. Students are burned out from a year of working hard and pressing forward towards a tantalizingly close summer break. Coaches and directors are scrambling to organize banquets and other end-of-year ceremonies.Teachers are flustered by a final spurt of finalizing grades and planning exams and administrators, in turn, are busy churning out exam-schedules.
This year’s exam schedule is unusual, differing from ones of the past. Instead of a week of half-days, students will have 4 full-length school days that include a mix of exams and regular classes, broken up by Memorial Day that Monday. Two out of these four days will feature senior-only exams at the end of the day, serving as a study hall for all other students. This is followed by a half-day much like exam days of previous years and then the last day of school: a half-day in which students only attend first through third period classes and then spend two hours in Zone.
“There are pros and cons to the new exam schedule, I guess,” junior Marlise Arellano said. “Our exams seem to be more spread out so that would be more time to study, but I don’t want to be in school longer or spend my last day of school mostly in Zone.”
This slightly confusing schedule is due to several complications. McNeil’s graduation is the first ceremony on Friday instead of Saturday. The need to organize graduation practice and senior exams significantly altered the schedule.
