Gelb Science Center classroom remained empty following two sick days.
Following the cancellation of Thursday and Friday classes and activities due to campus sickness, teachers were forced to adjust lesson plans to accommodate the loss of class time. A follow-up email sent by Head of School Dr. Raynard Kington announced that Head of School Day (HOSD) will be postponed to Spring Term to prevent further disruption to the winter schedule beyond the cancellations on January 25 and January 26.
Caroline Odden, Dean of Studies, highlighted how the extended four-day weekend served as a chance for students to rest and recover. She mentioned that because HOSD is traditionally held during Winter Term, instructors are used to adapting their curriculum pacing to accommodate for a missing day.
“The time off is a supportive measure for students, allowing those who are sick to rest up and catch up. Instructors have updated course plans and communicated changes to students, typically through Canvas… Instructors are familiar with the process of adjusting courses when Head of School Day occurs every winter, so they did not require support to adjust to this change. Department chairs are always available to help instructors when they have questions,” wrote Odden in an email to The Phillipian.
Scott Hoenig, Instructor in Math, Statistics, and Computer Science, shared that he adjusted his curriculum every winter anyway to account for HOSD. Since his lesson plan was tailored to fit in the removal of a 40-minute period, the two sick days did not pose a significant obstacle to his classes. Hoenig emphasized that foreseeing a day off allowed him to make necessary adjustments to assignments and lesson plans without too much complication.
“I don’t think I had any real challenges in adapting the lesson plan. I already had a day set aside for Head of School Day. I was expecting that it was going to be a Monday, but it didn’t turn out to be that way. Really, I do that every winter, set aside a day for Head of School Day, and it was around now, so I was already assuming that I was going to have to make adjustments, and I had that space built in there,” said Hoenig.
While many teachers accommodated for HOSD taking place on Monday and removing a 40-minute period, the loss of a longer 75-minute period did force some instructors to reschedule content. Jackson Goldman, Instructor in Chemistry, described how he approached the situation by assigning work originally planned to be done in class as homework instead.
“Overall [the cancellation] has taken some updating, a little bit of work, a little bit of planning, but it hasn’t created anything too consequential. My class was intending to do a lab on the two days that school got canceled. Fortunately, it is a short lab so I just had to look at the schedule and decided that the lab could be done on Monday so I shifted the lab to Monday… We did lose one 75-minute period but it is essentially getting replaced with a 40-minute period. It is 35 minutes of instruction, now it is 35 minutes where students would have been doing post-lab calculations, which can also be done outside of class,” said Goldman.
While some classes, such as electives, are more flexible in adjusting material to fit tighter schedules, others are already packed with content and could suffer from losing an entire 75-minute period. Aviva Halani, Instructor in Math, Statistics, and Computer Science, noted how the syllabus of her elective class was easier to change in comparison to her other classes that relied more heavily on class time.
“Luckily, in Math 630, it’s an elective course and there’s nowhere in particular that we needed to get, so we’ll just adjust, skip the homework plan, and we’ll just have one fewer day for the term… I am concerned for my 590 class, AP Calculus BC. It’s a course that’s already really, really full. It is hard to complete all of the content as it is and to lose the 75-minute block, it’s a big deal… In some of the courses, it’s already tight in terms of the amount of class time that we have and the content that we need to cover,” said Halani.
Sarah Driscoll, Instructor in English, pointed to the independence of Andover students as a factor that makes it easier for teachers to feel comfortable shifting around assignments, highlighting flexibility as a helpful skill in all walks of life.
“Students here at Andover luckily are really independent intellectually. If you assign them something to do they are able [to do it] without much help. I think it would be harder at a different type of school, but at a place like Andover where students are more independent, and apt to be able to do assignments without help, makes this less problematic than at a school where students would need a lot more assistance or guidance… This is something that happens in life. Life doesn’t move in one straight line. You have to make adjustments, and things happen. It’s a good skill for both students and teachers to learn,” said Driscoll.
