County school day differs greatly from HHS

The Harrisonburg High School schedule consists of 4 blocks. These 4 blocks stay
the same every day, every class lasting an estimated ninety minutes. If you have
a full year class you will have it every other day unless it is full year every
day. Turner Ashby and Spotswood high school schedules are different.
        The T.A. and Spotswood schedule has four blocks but alternate on even and odd days.
 So if it were an odd day then students would have blocks 1,3,5, and 7. If
it were an even day it would be 2,4,5, and 6. All students have 5th block every
day. So students in these schools get to take all of their classes all year.
        Our schedule gives us one semester to learn a years worth of work, we are
expected to learn all the material in half of the time. Even though the other
bell schedule does offer the classes every other day, you stick with them all
year as opposed to learning the information and not using it again for another
half of year. This way the information stays fresh in your head and is still
used all through the year.
        It is difficult to take a class at the start of one year and have to take the
second part of the class a year later. Being expected to remember all of the
information that was taught a year earlier is quite overwhelming. The first
weeks of school there is a little reviewing and going over the basics but not a
years worth. Maybe if we offered the same schedule as the rest of the schools
we would not have students taking full year classes instead of the semester
that they are expected to take. If our school already offered the full year
classes as a basic schedule then we would not have as many students having to
take the alternative option to our average classes. This way we have less
students suffering and more progress being made.
T.A. and Spotswood school days start at 8:15 a.m. and end at 2:45 p.m. How can the other schools start after us and still get released before us? They take more classes then we do. It seems to only make sense that would be released early, but we are not. We deal with a longer school day on a harder schedule.
        If you are defeated by a class it discourages a student from giving their all.
Some need more time to learn and make the adjustment. Getting used to a
subject, concept, or a new idea always takes some getting used to. Some students
adapt faster than others, that is a given. Is school supposed to favor all
students in general? Not just the fast learning and the naturally skilled?
        With all of the talk regarding the differences of our schedules, it does bring
the question to mind of why we do not work on an even/odd bell schedule. All of
our peer schools work on this type of bell schedule. What sets us apart? Were
we given this type of schedule in the hopes of boosting the average level of
our students’ academics? Was there some type of student study that showed that
high school students learn better focusing on 4 classes half the time then 8
classes for a whole year? These questions have never really been discussed.
        Our school schedule seems to have gone unquestioned; never really discussed or offering any option for change.