Questions sparked as schedules came out, at the bottom of class schedules, students saw ‘Advisory’ for the first time in their career as high schoolers. On the first day, teachers put up schedules for the next two days, which included three classes of advisory time in their third period classroom. Advisory will be implemented a few times every month and will soon be added into daily schedules for the next school year. Why was advisory added and what is planned in the future?
Assistant principal, Steven Leib, likes the idea of advisory. He believes that it can be a very positive experience for both students and staff.
“Try to lean into it, try to get to know people, try to engage in the activities. If you fight and you resist it, it’s just a missed opportunity,” Leib said.
Leib considers advisory as a “home base.” He wants the classrooms to feel like a tight knit group that you can go to for anything.
“So, I love the idea of shrinking the world for some people for some of our students, so that it feels like there’s somewhere where somebody knows you instead of being lost in this crowd,” Leib said.
Advisories will meet pretty frequently so that students can catch up on work or do things like Panorama surveys.
“We looked at over the course of the year, how could we try to touch base at least once a month. Now, it doesn’t always work out like that. Sometimes there’s like twice a month because we thought maybe it would be a really good time to take Panorama Surveys,” Leib said.
East High School principal, Jill Versteeg, believes that advisory is a very necessary time for students so that class time doesn’t get fully cut for things that are needed to be taught in classes.
“Yes, it’s still taking away from teaching time, but the teacher still has 25 to 30 minutes built into the day to still meet with their students,” Versteeg said.
There is an app that the district and schools are using called “Wayfinder”. This app provides the goals in advisory for each month.
“So, it started with August was purpose, September was Collaboration, and October is agency,” Versteeg said.
Students will have to adjust to advisory being every month.
“So, it is kind of an adjustment, but some of these things kind of came to us in August, like with some requirements. And so then you have times where you have to make quick adjustments,” Versteeg said.
The principal and the assistant principals believe that you should go to advisory and have fun.
“Because, if you fight and you resist it, it’s just a missed opportunity. Like try to make the most of it,” Leib said.
It’s a fun and educational opportunity for the students as well as the teachers and they try to emphasize that as much as possible.
“So, I do like it because it’s the idea of someone being heard and otherwise you’re just lost on the shuffle. It’s always good as we make it though,” Leib said.