Maximizing Free Time: Seniors’ reduced schedules provide downtime and opportunity for their futures

“Whenever I get to leave early it feels like I’m released from the shackles of East,” senior Reagan Solenberger said. “The senioritis is hitting, and it’s really awful.”

A reduced schedule is a luxury available to seniors who either already have all their graduation requirements, or have them scheduled in their current class, giving them free hours where they don’t need to be at school. 

Solenberger works two separate jobs while simultaneously being a physics cadet teacher, an IB Diploma student and a violinist for East’s orchestra.

Solenberger only has one less hour than the typical seven-period schedule to teach herself calculus-based physics and get everything else done. But for her, it makes all the difference. 

On Mondays, she has an extra 50 minutes at her disposal, which she typically uses to run errands or finish chores around the house. On Tuesdays, Solenberger makes a stop at the gym before going to her first job and teaches swim lessons to elementary and pre-schoolers. Thursday, Solenberger comes home to crank out as much homework as possible before heading to her second job at The Little Gym in the Village.

To qualify for a reduced schedule, students are required to have no other commitments within the school that might impede their ability to take a class off such as journalism or debate. 

Inversely, senior Gabe Anderson has only one hour in his entire senior year schedule — English 4. 

But Anderson hadn’t planned on having a reduced schedule — it just so happened that the electives he chose throughout his high school career filled up every requirement except for an additional English credit. 

“I let my counselor tell me whatever classes I needed to do that year,” Anderson said. “I signed up for all those and then whatever area I had left, I filled the classes that I actually wanted to do, which happened to fill my requirements.”

Anderson works at Kansas City Country Club and can pick up nearly eight additional hours every day thanks to his reduced schedule. All of his earnings are budgeted for college in the coming fall, with some room being left for personal expenses. 

On the contrary, some seniors have full course loads, Senior Ashley Freund runs the Student Store for two class periods on top of being an assistant editor for the yearbook for an additional two class periods. These leave no room for any non-graduation requirements, as the remaining hours are all core classes. 

“It’s definitely harder to go to school when you know all your friends are able to go home all the time,” Freund said. “It’d be nice to be able to nanny or work or just rest like everyone else, but I can’t.”

A large contributor to a reduced schedule is planning for them ahead of time. Likely, students won’t pick every single class needed to fill every single requirement, like in Anderson’s case. This causes them to have to take more classes they don’t like in their senior year instead of having a free period.

Classes like Financial Literacy and Health are often pushed aside until senior year, yet both those classes together make up a full year’s worth of course credit — something that can easily take over a senior’s time off.

“I know a lot of kids don’t like taking a bunch of filler classes that they [aren’t] really interested in,” Anderson said. “Being able to go out into the real world, whether that’s an internship or more hours at work, I think is really beneficial.”