April 8, 2020

Welcome back to the High School Corner!

 

Picture this: eleven high school students and one Spanish teacher logging into Zoom at 10am sharp on Monday, April 5 for Spanish and Theology class. 

 

As everyone’s faces pop up and we wave hello at each other through the screen, Srta. Onofre unmutes herself and says, “Sophia, I’m going to prove to you that I have magical powers. I am going to guess what you did this weekend.”  

 

“Okay…” I say, somewhat confused. 

 

“You stayed at home!” Srta Onofre exclaims excitedly before everyone dissolves into a fit of laughter.

 

Srta. Onofre was right—I  did stay home all weekend! Given that the circumstances in which we currently find ourselves are unprecedented, we are doing our best in the High School to keep a positive outlook and make things fun. Although Zoom meetings and virtual classes aren’t the ideal forum for academic work, jokes like Srta. Onofre’s keep us going. We have tried to stick as closely to our regular class schedule as possible with the goal of maintaining some degree of normalcy in our lives. 

 

A typical day for an SCM high schooler attending virtual classes begins at 9am with student-led prayer and a check-in via Zoom. Depending on the day of the week, students then participate in Humanities, Language Arts/AP English Literature, Spanish, and Theology classes until lunch at 12pm. These classes include a mix of lectures from teachers, class discussions/seminars, presentations from students, and work in smaller groups. At 1pm, we all reconvene on Zoom for—depending on the day— AP Computer Science, AP Environmental Science, Physics, AP Statistics, Math, or Current Events. Our day ends at 3:30pm as usual. 

 

Our current homework load is the same as it was before, which means that a good part of our day that isn’t spent having classes on Zoom is taken up by homework. 

 

Fortunately, the fact that we don’t have to commute to and from school every day and our regularly scheduled after-school activities have been cancelled frees up our schedules more, meaning we are able to use the time we typically don’t have to explore other interests at home or spend time with family. 

 

We’re grateful we have been able to preserve the integrity of SCM and our high school as best we can online. There is much that we’re learning from this experience!

 

Thank you for reading; be sure to check back next week for more content!

Jacob B, and Sophia D.