Quarter block system creates unbalanced schedules

PHOTO: The 2020-21 school year resumes with a quarter system that is leaving students with uneven class schedules.

By Mason Garcia,

BlueDevilHub.com Staff–

Throughout the first few weeks of school students have had mixed feelings about the new quarter system put in place by the Davis Joint Unified School District. 

Some students are experiencing imbalanced schedules, leaving them to deal with some quarters that are much busier than others. Many students have quarters stacked with mostly AP and Honors classes, while their other quarters have electives and easier classes. Students are feeling more stressed with the demanding workloads that come with their unbalanced schedules. 

“I have three pretty hard AP [classes the] first quarter: Composition and Literature, Government and Calculus BC,” senior Sarah Lagattuta said.  “It’s a pretty big workload but better than having six classes every day. Next quarter I have only one AP [Chemistry] and then another science [Zoology and Botany] and peer tutoring.”

Taking multiple AP courses also raises students’ concerns about AP testing. AP students are worried about having to complete all of their courses in half of the time they would have during a normal school year. These students will also have to wait a seemingly long time after the quarters change to continue learning from their AP teachers. This will ultimately force students to do a great deal of studying independently for the AP exams. 

“My main concern is that we won’t be well prepared for AP tests in the spring,” senior Nathan Solomon said. “For example, Human Geo and Government are both one quarter classes, so I’ll only have them for a couple months, and then half a year later I’ll be expected to remember everything.” 

While AP students are being faced with difficult decisions such as choosing what to focus their energy on studying, they still enjoy some aspects of the quarter system. Students are appreciating the shorter school days, especially with the larger amounts of homework being assigned.

“I’m also fairly stressed out with classes right now, since all my classes are assigning roughly an hour of homework a day,” Solomon said. “In total, that should mean school is actually taking less time than when it was in person.”