Hot Topics at Student Council: Schedule, Values, and Culture
Annika Larson | alarson23@dtechhs.org
At the d.council meeting on November 29, the main topics were the school’s bell schedule, concerns about long-term FlexTime changes, and a student-raised issue regarding culture changes. Students who ride Caltrain to school have raised concerns about struggling to get on the shuttle in time to make it to the next train after school gets out; d.council discussed the issues with last year’s system and proposed solutions to implement for the future. The meeting was open for any d.tech student to bring questions and concerns to the council. One such concern was the change from WYN time to Flex time; d.council is working with school administration to create the bell schedule for next school year. d.tech values were also discussed, with concerns expressed that d.tech has become too similar to traditional public schools since the COVID-19 pandemic, and one student’s allegations that the administration is trying to discreetly remove “rebellion” from the school’s stated values by taking down the school’s value posters about rebellion from classrooms.
d.council said that their largest project was working on the bell schedule for next year, and they discussed whether students might prefer a 70-minute single Flex period or two 35-minute Flex periods. Students who attended the d.council meeting posed questions about the council’s involvement with the shift from last year’s WYN time, where students had two 50-minute flexible periods at the end of each school day to sign up for any activity they wanted, to this year’s Flex time. Council members highlighted their efforts to ease this transition: they said they made efforts to solicit feedback from advisories by doing “huge focus groups” as well as responding to feedback from students and teachers, including that students did not have enough activities in WYN time and were using the time to socialize or use their phones, rather than working on homework, club activities, or curiosity projects. The council also mentioned that the administration didn’t approach them about the changes until later in the year, making it harder to provide input.
Last year, train travel was eased by letting students who needed to catch the shuttle leave at 3:25 p.m., ten minutes before school normally got out, but several problems with this approach were discussed by d.council: the shuttle didn’t have enough capacity to accommodate everyone, and other students who didn’t need to take the shuttle sometimes left early as well. It was also claimed that early release also posed an issue to state education requirements for minutes of instruction. One proposed action was to require students who leave early to show a train ticket, clipper card, and/or special student ID sticker; another was to talk with school administration about the issues with state regulations. While no clear decision was made at this meeting, the council is working towards finding a solution that allows d.tech students to catch the shuttle more easily.
The topic shifted to d.tech’s values when sophomore Peyton Wright asked the student council their opinion on what he alleged was the d.tech administration’s attempts to remove or deemphasize the school’s value of “rebellion” by taking down posters describing it from d.tech classrooms. d.tech’s stated values are currently “community,” “rebellion”, “liberation,” and “respect.” d.council noted that student-created art depicting the rebellion value was still up, and suggested that the removal may be because students interpreted the value of rebellion differently than the administration expected. The school’s rebellion posters are still up in some rooms. Wright also expressed frustration with the administration because he felt that they didn’t put enough effort into running the school, and because his posters respectfully criticizing the Yondr system were taken down. The council responded by touting the effort put into crafting this year’s schedule in spite of the timeframe the administration gave them, and saying that the administration has the best interest of students in mind. d.council also said that there was an approval process for posters that should be followed, and that issues around censorship and school values are important, but not d.council’s area of authority nor expertise.
When responding to a student’s questions, d.council noted that they’ve received a lot of feedback that d.tech is becoming too similar to traditional public schools, and said that they plan to expand the amount of time that students have discretion to spend how they like (similar to this year’s Flex time) in next year’s schedule. DRG training was also discussed, with d.council agreeing that it’s important that students learn how to use the school’s equipment; DRG education is lacking among some upperclassmen due to school closures for COVID-19 safety.
Overall, d.council puts in a lot of work behind the scenes in working with the administration, even when their policies and influence are not outwardly visible. Elections for new d.council members will be held after winter break on Friday, January 6.
If you have questions you’d like The Dragon to ask d.council, please email them to us at dragon@dtechhs.org for our reporting on future meetings.