While many students use spring break as a time to relax and have fun, others say they use their break for catching up on school work and training for sports.
Junior Bella Ngyuen said she spent time with her family in Las Vegas over break and also used it to catch up on work for her AP classes.
“Half of my break will consist of me doing AP Seminar and prepping for my AP Chemistry test,” Ngyuen said before break started. “The break, ideally, should be used as a time period for rest, spending time with your friends and having fun. (It should be) a time period that school and stress should not be a part of. People should be taking an actual break completely free from school.”
Junior Ava Iribarren said she spent break relaxing from the stress of school by doing volunteer work, visiting her grandparents’ beach house in Newport and hanging out with her friends during the break.
“I feel like, with midterms coming up and then it being like mini finals and all that stuff, I just need some time to detox from school,” Iribarren said before break. “Even (during) four-day weekends, you still do homework over it, so it’ll be nice to have a true break from school instead of a break with lots of homework.”
Social science teacher Chris Farina said he did not assign homework over spring break in accordance with the board policy, which states that no assignments can be due on the seven-period day after students come back from a break. However, Farina said he did assign work that was due the following block periods after spring break.
“If you’re up-to-date on everything, then you shouldn’t be assigned any additional work that would make you take up time out of your spring break,” Farina said before break. “Outside of that, you should be able to enjoy your time and relax and have a little fun. If, on the other hand, you’ve been falling behind on work, then it is a really hard time (after break) to be able to catch up. Because if you’re behind on work, you’re going to be missing some of the context for the current lessons in almost every class, so getting caught up is probably the most important thing you can do.”
For some student athletes, spring break was also a break from sports. Boys lacrosse coach Edward Hattler said his teams did not practice over break to give players a chance to relax, continuing a tradition set by the previous head coach last year.
“It seems to me like a lot of students have a variety of things that they’re doing (over break),” Hattler said before break. “It’s a lot of stress, so I think they should be doing something to relax and something that they enjoy.”
However, because of their upcoming championship, track and field head coach Michael Davidson said spring break was a great time for students to focus on training since they had some downtime from schoolwork. Davidson still held practices on Monday through Thursday during spring break, and athletes were expected to attend all of them.
“We’re coming down to the championship portion of our season towards the end and so we need to do that to keep sharp and to continue sharpening in getting ready for the championships,” Davidson said before break.
Davidson also said for students who were trying to catch up on work over spring break, track practice can provide a mental break.
“Kids who have some active exercise tend to do better (on schoolwork because) it gives them a mental break from the work that they do,” Davidson said. “So, the hope is that by coming to practice, it gives them an opportunity to get away from (schoolwork).”
