Last year, all students that attended school physically got to experience a new concept for the school: “Focused Friday.”

Focused Fridays allowed students to sleep in while continuing school work at home later on in the day.This allowed teachers to have time to prepare lesson plans, connect with virtual students, and catch up on grading.

Focused Fridays should be brought back in some form.

Focused Fridays were great for students who have poor sleep schedules. They recovered from the sleep they missed before they had to return to school. This inturn allowed students to be more productive with the in-person school days they had.

On the other hand, some students did not do well with Focused Fridays as they couldn’t bring themselves to go online to find what work they had to do, thus leading to failing grades.
Students were instructed to log into Schoology and complete assignments that were given to them; however, many students failed to do so. They thought they had been granted a three-day weekend each week.

As a compromise, if four-day school weeks and remote learning on Fridays is not feasible, the school could instead have a short day once a week. Instead of having a full day with only some subjects, it would be better to have a weekly short day where all periods are attended. This would let teachers get homework back or even give out homework they knew wouldn’t get done online.

Additionally, students would be able to go home early, get more sleep, or socialize with friends without the guilt of not having finished all of their school work for the day. They would also be more likely to do their work because they received it in person. Not only would they more likely do the work, but it would be much harder to make excuses for not doing physical work as opposed to the less reliable digital work. Excuses like “my internet went off” or “my computer didn’t work” wouldn’t apply.

Focused Fridays have more pros than cons. If they can’t be brought back, then the school should at least implement one shortened day per week for both students and teachers to catch up and breathe.