By Hannah Ellington, News Editor
Dead silence. That is all you hear. All around you, people are working diligently, staring at their papers, pencils flying. However, you cannot seem to focus. The only thing on your mind is the waffle you wish you ate this morning or the apple you should have grabbed.
Suddenly, the sound of your stomach growling is louder than your thoughts about food. You start to feel your face becoming hot, most likely as red as that apple still sitting on your kitchen counter. Of course the one thing that broke the silence was your grumbling stomach, as if it knew how quiet the room was. You immediately regret skipping breakfast with the knowledge that lunch is still so far away.
Each new school year comes with changes, but the one thing many students are beginning to dread is the new schedule, especially when it comes to lunch. All lunches have been pushed back 30 minutes due to Empower Time. Instead of Empower Time being after third period and lunch as it was the year prior, it is now after second period.
“The decision was made to have Empower Time earlier because we thought it would be more effective,” Assistant Principal Caroline Pearce said. “We used some success that other schools have had by having it after second — Manteo High School, for example — and it works better. Because it’s earlier in the day, kids are more academically orientated because they haven’t had lunch.”
Students are equally distributed among all three lunches based off of their third-period teacher. Last year, lunch times were earlier: Instead of starting at 12:15, third lunch starts at 12:47.
“It (the lunch schedule) was in place initially by someone other than me, but what I try to do is put as many teachers as I can that are in the sample discipline, like most of the English teachers eat at the same time, PE teachers all eat at the same time and then I balance it,” Pearce said. “I do it very reflectively and very thoughtfully.”
That 30-minute pushback can seem like an eternity, though.
“I’m starving by third lunch. I do not mean that lightly,” senior Ida Greenlee said. “And eating at 6:30 in the morning, then eating at 1, that gap of time is the worst period for me. I lose all energy and I am so hungry.”
Some students have even jokingly started calling third lunch “dinner” because it seems so late.
“It’s really hard to sit through class when you’re super duper hungry. I’ve always had second lunch and I miss it,” junior Ceilidh McLean said. “In the middle of second period, no joke, my stomach starts growling.”
Not only are students hungry, but some believe their learning is affected as well.
“I’m in an AP Chemistry and my hunger and my lack of energy — I can’t focus. It’s bad,” Greenlee said.
But it all starts with breakfast. Time and time again, the research has shown that “breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” For many students, eating breakfast is not a priority.
“I never eat breakfast because I usually get up too late and I have to go and get ready and by the time I’m ready, I have to go to school,” McLean said.
In addition to McLean’s worries about skipping breakfast herself, she also points out that for some students, breakfast isn’t an option at all.
“It’s way too late for kids who maybe don’t have the opportunity to eat breakfast or don’t have food at home and yet they are made to wait all day,” she said.
There are also those who believe lunch is not truly that late, such as sophomore Grace Carmines.
“I like the fact that it’s something that breaks up the two longest classes, but I don’t know how to feel about it. I guess I would rather have it how it is,” she said.
There is one way to temporarily fix the problem — snacks. Students believe that if they have third lunch, then their third-period teacher should allow them to indulge in “snacktime” at the beginning of class.
“Mr. (Ray) Richards actually does give us a snack time, which sounds really childish, but it holds me over,” Greenlee said.
A supporter of “snacktime,” McLean suggested teachers think more of the students than their own class rules.
“The teachers should take it into consideration more for the kids instead of their own, ‘Oh man, it’s going to bring in bugs.’ Just make sure they clean up after themselves,” she said with a laugh.
Although having a late lunch may seem like the end of the world some days, it does not have to be. By eating breakfast or bringing in something to nibble on, students can store up enough energy to carry on until lunch.
“If they start eating breakfast and/or bringing a healthy snack to eat at the beginning of third period, that would be great,” Pearce said. “So bring your apple, bring your grapes, bring some Nabs and eat it at the beginning. I think once everyone gets into that routine it won’t seem like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m starving.’ ”
Junior Hannah Ellington can be reached at [email protected].
