Photo by: Alex Gross ’24
With the introduction of the block schedule this year, important changes are being considered and made pertaining to the community period which has affected clubs and students across the campus.
The community period has entailed a variety of activities, club meetings, and surveys for Brophy students to express how their school year is going.
“The community period is meant to find time for those things that happen in the thin spaces outside of class,” said Mr. Pete Burr.
Mr. Burr said that the block schedule is meant to slow down the day while the community period is meant to provide intervals between classwork for students in the schedule.
This was planned to allow students to have more time to complete their homework and learn about certain subjects in class.
The Brophy administration is open to student feedback and willing to make adjustments to the community period if necessary. It is up to the students and not the faculty to decide whether the community period is beneficial.
“It doesn’t really matter what I think. I will continue to ask students what they think and we will continue to keep tweaking it” said Mr. Burr.
The Brophy administration is considering using a program called Sown to Grow alongside the community period. Sown to Grow would help look over student’s surveys and provide assistance on allowing both the administration and students to see feedback on their personal, academic, and mental well-being.
The introduction of websites and programs like Sown to Grow could have a large impact on students’ experience with the community period as a whole.
Every community period starts with students checking into their team rooms. The team rooms are designed for students to feel a sense of community with others in their group.
Clubs all across the campus have been affected by the community period in different ways.
“It’s been great, it’s provided us a lot more time than we previously had last year.” said Leo Roth ’24. Leo Roth is one of the leaders of the Amateur Chess Club which was introduced and formed in the past few years. Roth said “It’s allowed us to have more members and allowed us to do more in our time together”.
It remains to be seen how the community period will continue to affect daily life at Brophy and hopefully help students in the future.
