Faith Collins
Co-Editor-in-Chief
The newest campus change, FLEX, was adopted by faculty and staff to provide students with extra time for homework and assignments between class periods. Other schools such as Clark and Harlan have already incorporated FLEX into their schedules with the intention to create a 30 minute time period for students to visit any teacher on campus and get much needed work done. A teacher can “flag” a student to their classroom, or the student can flag themselves to the teacher.
The campus provided five days of FLEX training before fully applying the program to everyone’s schedules. Flex days are every Tuesday and Thursday after second period and before third period.
While faculty and staff may have introduced this program to reduce the stress on students and teachers, there is some mixed feedback.
“I think FLEX benefits the students by giving them more time to focus on finishing up any work that’s due,” freshman Caitlyn Poehler said.
For junior Emily Kramer, an athlete in Water Polo and Swimming, FLEX sends a negative message for students who are on top of their work.
“It’s a crutch for kids who don’t necessarily want to get their work done. It wastes time for kids who actually do their work outside of school like they’re supposed to,” Kramer said.
Kramer said she plans to do Drivers Ed during FLEX since she’ll already have her work done.
Senior Daniel Guerrero, however, has a slightly different perspective.
“So far I’m comfortable with FLEX. It’s really easy to manage the sessions that I want to participate in,” Guerrero said.
Some students like Guerrero are neutral about FLEX and may only have a few components they want to see changed.
“I would change how students who are eligible to go off campus cannot leave campus during FLEX. This is really unfair to the students who don’t need tutoring or to make up any missing work” Guerrero said.
Mrs. Thornton, the director of FLEX at on campus, shares advice for getting comfortable with the program. She also answers questions that some students might have about FLEX that may not have been clear in the training.
“If a student isn’t flagged by their teacher, and hasn’t flagged them- selves by the time Flexisched locks at 5pm the day before FLEX, I as- sign the student a place. The first place I fill is the computer labs. If students are near a computer or in a quiet computer lab they can still work even though they may not have found a place on their own through FLEX. The second place we fill is the library, and then after that, the Cafeteria. If the student’s teachers have open spots, I’ll flag them there too,” Thornton said.
Some students may also wonder what classes can override what other classes in order to flag a student that had already been flagged somewhere else.
“Core teachers will have priority days that go in alphabetical order. The first day of FLEX, English held the priority, the second day will be math, science, and then social studies,” Thornton said.
Thornton also states that if a teacher wants to flag a kid from another teacher, but neither have priority, the teacher who flagged the student first takes the priority.
If students or parents have any questions about FLEX, they can as their teachers or Mrs. Thornton in room B102.
*Correction Northwest Vista offers Flex scheduling, but it’s a different program than at NISD schools.