LTHS Eyes Dramatically Changing Schedule

LA GRANGE, IL – Lyons Township High School is planning to form a committee to look into changing to a "modified block schedule."

But officials said they wanted to learn lessons from the overhaul of grading a couple of years ago. The school board later backed off some of the changes.

At Monday's board meeting, Leslie Owens, the school's director of student services, noted the possibility of a modified block schedule.

With such a schedule, students on certain days would have longer class periods. To offset that, they would not go to other classes on those days.

"We love to see more engaging classrooms where kids are able to have discussions and feedback can be given to students on the topic," Owens said. "When you are on a 48-minute schedule, sometimes getting momentum to do those types of things is really difficult."

She said the school plans to research a modified block schedule, among other options. Depending on that research, the school may move forward with a further examination, which would involve parents, she said.

Board member Michael Thomas advised the school to learn its lessons from changes to the grading system a couple of years ago. Carrying out those revisions during the pandemic, he said, was not the best time.

"How can we further get feedback so we can maybe get to the point where it's not so, depending on whatever the findings are, controversial and combustible?" Thomas said.

"I think that's a point well taken," Owens said. "(The grading overhaul) was probably the biggest large-scale change we've done in a while. Going back and looking at what we did would be well worth our time."

Outside the pandemic, the last time the school made major changes to its schedule was nine years ago.