The voice over the PA system is barely audible as students sit down for their second class of the day. It’s the announcements, but at this point, it’s white noise for most students. They carry on with their conversations about last night’s Warriors’ game, the latest fashion trends and school dances, oblivious to the announcements.
There is nothing wrong with the ASB officers who do the announcements: they always try their best, the happy birthday song is nice and the joke of the day is sort of funny sometimes.
The problem lies with how students listen to the announcements. Even if students want to hear the announcements, it’s usually impossible because they are drowned out by students’ chatter.
Moreover, the timing of announcements makes no sense. It’s right after tutorial, when students are just getting settled into their class. The announcements are just soft, crackling noise over the PA that students are supposed to listen to out of the blue.
At this point, announcements are a waste of time for everyone involved — officers who have to do them, the students who are supposed to listen to them and the teachers who need to teach their lesson.
One alternative to daily PA announcements is to instead post the announcements into the school’s Facebook group.
Almost every student is part of this group. Students can go on their phones whenever they have free time and read important notices. It’s easy to forget the dates of certain events because students only hear it once over the announcements. By posting announcements in the Facebook group, students can go back to the post and check the dates of events.
It might also be worth exploring the option of putting announcements on Canvas. Every student has a Canvas account, and if they’re curious about what is going on, they could log in to their accounts and take a look.
By making it digital, we can skip over the outdated technology of the PA system and save the time of ASB officers, students who don’t really care about the announcements and teachers who can begin their lesson once the bell rings.
In addition, there can be a bulletin in the new student center where announcements are posted for students who do not have Facebook.
The extra five minutes could be tacked onto lunch. Adding five minutes to lunch would give upperclassmen plenty of time to get their food and come back to school without having to drive recklessly. It would add more value than having announcements.
No matter what, we need to figure out a way to fix the announcements. The current system is disadvantageous to all involved — students, ASB officers and teachers
