For the past year and more, remote learning has challenged students, teachers and parents in unprecedented ways.  

For many students, the only thing that made online learning more bearable was the advent of asynchronous Wednesdays. On these valuable days, students were given time to mentally recharge by catching up on school work and preparing for the next two days of taxing online education.

Of course, the school board didn’t see things that way and it led to a month of May that left me feeling like a dead battery, as I was so drained from the overwhelming load of school work.

The Wednesday synchronous classes were added at the worst time possible. Both students and teachers struggled to navigate this new hybrid learning model with its new confusing schedule and to manage both online and in-person students. Thank goodness it was only a month.

If worst comes to worst, and we end up having to go into the online learning model again due to new COVID concerns or another pandemic, the school board should support their students by allowing them to keep their break in the middle of the week to mentally revive themselves, not adding more class time that will leave students feeling drained and overworked.