PRO: Beloved asynchronous days should stay in some form next year

Asynchronous Fridays have provided much needed assistance through this crazy year of learning as students have spent so much time in front of screens. They have helped students stay on top of work, and if they are taken away, they would be missed.

Asynchronous days should not be eliminated totally. They have helped us this year, and there are advantages to keeping them in some form.
To maintain periodic asynchronous days, I suggest maybe having one once every cycle or having an early dismissal on Fridays for an asynchronous afternoon where clubs can meet and work.
This is a fair amount of time to allow students to ease back into full school. The process of returning was quick to now being back to 100% capacity. Students have had to go through lots of change over the past 14 months, so an asynchronous day once a cycle would be best to help students ease back into a more routine schedule.
Asynchronous days have many benefits with them that make them so valued to keep. First, they provide a nice mental break for students.
Time away from screens is so valued because normally students and teachers spend an average of around seven hours online on a typical school day. This can be overwhelming and strenuous for students.
For the students who remain virtual, these asynchronous days are a much needed break away from the screen. Along with this, students in the building are required to join calls from their laptops or complete work online.
Whether people are in-person or online, the laptops and screens are needed.
If students were to be 100% in-person, I still feel that screens would be utilized much more than previous years. Teachers have now become much more familiar with online work and tools. The impression we have of 100% in-person would most likely decrease the amount of time online, but I doubt it will be completely abandoned.
Students even seem to utilize laptops more than ever as a new preferred way for things like note-taking, testing and studying. The asynchronous time would be able to divide this time into a break.
Along with this time away from the screen, students would be able to have a catch-up day once a cycle to ensure they are not missing any work and review work from the previous cycle. This would help students get new work completed at their own pace and allow them to be better on top of everything.
Keeping asynchronous days would give students peace of mind and the extra time to complete work they may have missed or need some extra time to prioritize work that will need to be done. The threat of losing these days will make them more valuable. Plus, once a cycle allows for more work to be piled on to work on during asynchronous days.
Also, asynchronous days can promote positive time management skills in preparation for college, too.
These days occur in the way students structure them, so students get to practice time management skills to organize when they will get work completed. This is a skill that is great to be practiced before college.
The JC community has been working so hard to be flexible with different guidelines and changes within the world around them. With this in mind, I think it would be fair to say students have earned time that can be flexible with their schedules.
Another possible suggestion could be having students come in for half days on Fridays.
This is an idea that would allow for students to still enter the building and be in-person, but also give them time to work on assignments from all their classes. This would be another great way to ease into coming back for full five-day weeks.
With that idea, students will have the resources for help in school if needed, but they also would be given the time to complete things they may need extra time for. Students can use this time to review work, study, and even participate in extracurricular activities that are available.
If students spent those Fridays possibly participating in extracurriculars or working on their work inside school, they would be more involved, and this would help make up for the social interaction time lost in the 2020-2021 school year.
This day would still be able to give students that mental break and time off of screens by being in-person or joining different extracurriculars in-person.
Adapting from asynchronous days once a week to none would be a major challenge for many as these days have become cherished by so many.
These days have become a part of the normal routine at JC, so keeping at least one asynchronous day per cycle or half day Fridays would be the best way to ease into an entirely normal school year. – Madison Elliott

CON: Next school year should not have any asynchronous days

Asynchronous days take away from the “normalcy” that has been long overdue. Asynchronous days have stayed around for almost an entire school year, and people have been calling for a more normal lifestyle, and eliminating asynchronous days will bring school closer to this desired “normalcy.”

Having no structure to a school day does not help students. Some students will sleep in and only wake up to get online for Advisory. Then they go back to sleep. This does not teach students healthy habits.
With asynchronous days, students do not have a teacher supervising them while they are working, causing students to become more distracted while working.
Asking questions about the work is very hard during an asynchronous day. Students have to email each of their teachers with a question. Some teachers seem not check their email regularly, so sometimes students have to wait the entire weekend for an answer. This is not practical for trying to get work done in a timely fashion.
Having asynchronous days breaks a normal school routine. School weeks are five days long. Being back at 100% in-person learning, all students should be able to go in the building five days a week.
Asynchronous days don’t allow students to be in school to learn. A lot of students learn better in a classroom environment, and having an unstructured Friday does not help all students. This takes away from the sense of normalcy that students feel in a normal school year.
Going along with not being in school, students can’t see their friends and socialize; this makes the school that much less appealing.
To take attendance on Friday, students have to join an Advisory meeting at 10 am. This is a pain for students, trying to keep track of time while doing work. It is easy to lose track of time and miss Advisory while working on their assignments.
Student athletes still have to come on campus on Fridays for their practices, and some athletes are not yet old enough to drive themselves.
Instead of parents dropping off their students on their way to work, they have to find a way to come home from work earlier to drive their child to practice. This is very inconvenient for parents to have to drive their child to campus at 3 o’clock in the middle of a workday.
Asynchronous days make turning in work quite difficult. Some teachers make work due Sunday night, and some make work due by 11:59 on that Friday. It is difficult to keep track of all of the due dates.
Some teachers like to pile on work for their students on Fridays as a “catch up” day, and they will give over an hour’s worth of work per class.
This makes the workload difficult, especially when students want to enjoy their weekend and recharge for the following week.
We need to return to normal now. – Sydney Miller