Master Schedule Changes to Affect Students for the Second Semester

Carly Zhou, Staff Writer 

Another round of schedule changes will be made second semester in order to balance class sizes. Six sections will be added to the master schedule, including sections of NextGen Bio, Honors Chemistry, AP Political Science, Math 3, and others. 
In late October, the administration received notice that they were allowed four new sections based on the increased enrollment numbers registered earlier in the year. The administration decided to add these sections to the master schedule at the start of second semester rather than in the middle of first semester to prevent further disruption to student schedules.
“The good thing [about] this is that they are going to create relief across sections that have high class sizes,” Assistant Principal Mr. Kris Kough said. “Students will have new teachers [for the same class] in the same period, rather than a schedule change with periods.”
Since funding for two semester’s worth of four sections was provided by IUSD, this allowed for up to one semester’s worth of eight sections. 
At the start of the school year, over nine sections were added to the master schedule in order to reduce class sizes, causing changes to the schedules of over 700 students. 
“My schedule was changed twice during first semester … At the time, I was upset because I was still getting used to high school and the schedule changes made my overall experience a little bit harder,” freshman Amanda Nguyen said. “I am not looking forward to a second round of schedule changes next semester.”
Many students are concerned about the impact these schedule changes will have on their current schedule, such as junior Vaibhav Bommisetty
“I’m currently satisfied with my schedule and my teachers, so I would dislike having schedule changes next semester,” Bommisetty said. “I also feel [that] a schedule change for me next semester would be horrible as I’d need to get used to a different class dynamic, possibly new teachers, and actually get a feel for a different schedule halfway through the school year.”
However, many teachers believe that the addition of new sections to the master schedule is ultimately done in the best interests of students.
“The benefit of it is this going to help to eliminate some of those really large classes … which is always a good thing for students and teachers. If the classes are small, [students] get more personalized instruction,” Science Dept. Chair Mr. David Knight said
In past years, the addition of one or two sections at the start of second semester was common. However, according to teachers, this volume of section additions is unprecedented.
“I don’t remember the last time we added this many sections [for] second semester. That’s pretty unusual,” Knight said.