At Washburn Rural all students have a class midway through the day called advisory. This class was intended for working on homework and allowing students to have one constant teacher for their four years of high school. However, within the past two school years time in advisory has decreased dramatically.

Although advisory is a shortened class, having it five days a week can impact a student’s academic progress. This year a maximum of three days are offered for a student to work on their homework.

Tuesdays are now dedicated to an activity day, meaning leaving is restricted and teachers share information with students all hour. There is no advisory on Wednesday due to a schedule change and getting out earlier Also, depending on the week, Thursdays can be taken up by club.

This leaves little time to accomplish anything within advisory. As someone who uses that time to catch up on homework, I feel as though the amount of homework needing completion after school has increased.

As this time is limited, it can become even less for students who participate in other activities around school. I play in a trumpet ensemble for band which meets only during advisory on fridays, which gives me only one to two days a week.

Teachers and principals encourage all students to be involved at the school and find an activity to be a part of. In doing so advisory time gets taken away and although being involved is a great experience, it creates a small window of time to work on homework while at school.

If students are in activities after school such as; sports, theater, a job, they also have a disadvantage. Having a two hour practice after school means getting home late, staying up even later to complete homework and could affect energy given the next day at school.

Being a student involved in both during and after school activities it can be difficult at times to complete everything assigned to me. More advisory time would make academic success easier and create a more stress free environment.