As a student, I know firsthand how much of a difference a proper night's sleep makes to how we learn, focus, and function. Starting school earlier especially halfway through the year will only increase the pressure and fatigue we're already dealing with. Teenagers aren't just being lazy; science shows that our brains are wired to wake up later. Cutting our sleep short for the sake of a new schedule isn't going to boost our performance, it’s going to burn us out. We need the sleep-ins we currently have to be at our best academically and mentally. Please don’t take that away. Our health and education should come before timetable convenience.
Something that stood out and set this school apart to me was the timetable and how it worked well with my circadian rhythm. Changing the timetable will be a negative change and remove what makes this school better than others.
As a VCE student who already struggles with attendance and grades due to health issues, this change is concerning. These constant changes in timetable for not only VCE students but the rest of the years is stressful and disorientating for minimal affect in attendance of well being sessions. The student response is telling you that this will mostly affect student's wellbeing negatively, whether for sleep, change, health, or attendance reasons, which cannot be properly counteracted by brief wellbeing and communities sessions efforts. Look into how to make wellbeing sessions more helpful and why people aren't attending in the first place instead of making this unreasonably large adjustment.
I went to uni and gained a Bachelor of Social Work (Honors). I did 1000 hours of placement which I was not paid for, in fact, I paid just under $7000 for the privilege of working for free in 2 government agencies. I am now watching my HECS debt increase due to indexing, even though I am making payments. I am employed, working in the community sector with service users to support them in achieving positive outcomes. Positive outcomes which benefit the government. Free university education benefits society. I am punished by banks for having a HECS debt as it is used to assess my loan serviceability. Why do we continue to punish those who go to university? Our allied health workers, doctors, nurses, scientists, counselors, educators, veterinarians, lawyers, police officers, musicians, artists and many more including politicians. University education should be encouraged, not greed of the 5% of top income earners. FREE UNIVERSITY EDUCATION, WIPE OUR HECS DEBTS!!