Alternative Day.

[iBlueBox]

Basically new head teacher in our school, has said the dinner queues are too long, So he's propsing something, been called alternative day where, it goes.

first lesson
second lessons
break
third lesson
fourth lesson - Half way through 2 years, would go to lunch, then another 2 ect.
last lesson - half way through, another year would go in.

So what the problem a lot of students and staff are seeing that, the 30 minutes ( what he's shorting to ) has to be spent in the canteen , then off back to lesson, you wont be able to do anything else but sit there.

Problems a lot of us see with it, is there's clubs on at lunchs, people do course work, home work, go the library , non of that would been able to be done,

and all detentions would have to be after, School.

Me and a few friends, have a petition, posters around school, The deputy head has spoke to us and see's the concern but,

he says, Unless there's any other solutions to make the dinner line shorter, then this would go in place

I'm just wondering, does anyone have any ideas that we could add to our list.

[lawrawrrr]

We do this thing where years 7 and 8 are allowed in from 12:50 until quarter past 1, and years 9-11 sit in the hall until quarter past, then they line up down the corridor to go into the canteen, and every week the years change round, like one week it goes year 9, year 10, year 11, next week year 10, year 11, year 9 ETC ETC, so the same people don't always end up at the back!

But the little kids always go in first. I think it works quite well actually! Although what I've written probably makes NO sense... :S

[Chris]

Well at my old school there where 3 separate areas where you could buy and eat food. The best thing that they had was the portable hot trolley which had all of the snacky foods from the main canteen area. E.g. pizzas, baguettes, drinks, etc. Maybe you could suggest something like this to reduce the que?

[Neversoft]

And here I thought alternative day would be a day where the people at the end of the queue went first.

Anyway, to make the line shorter he should just hire more staff. Tight git.

[iBlueBox]

And here I thought alternative day would be a day where the people at the end of the queue went first.

Anyway, to make the line shorter he should just hire more staff. Tight git.

They already have more staff in the canteen at the moment, plus more staff would mean more tills according to our IT teacher, it's not an option to add more tills as they're all wired under the floors.

[Inseriousity.]

My old secondary school had the same system as -fire-girl-/laura. Rotate the years round each week. The only difference is that the other years didn't go in the hall. The idea was, you'd queue up if it was your year that was first, the others would be told to "go out and play" until it was their turn to line up and so on. Our lunch break actually ended up an hour as well :D


You don't actually say what the current system is though :P

[Red]

Well at my old school there where 3 separate areas where you could buy and eat food. The best thing that they had was the portable hot trolley which had all of the snacky foods from the main canteen area. E.g. pizzas, baguettes, drinks, etc. Maybe you could suggest something like this to reduce the que?

we had something similar to this! baguette line, snack food you just lift and then hot food and our lines where never bad but then again we only had like 500 pupils. my other secondary school had an early and late lunch depending on your year. how lng are your periods?

[Conservative,]

Yeah the rotation system is pretty good.

So 1 week - year 7s get first in the queue whilst others have to wait until a certain time before they can get it. So all the year 7s have by then.
then week 2 - year 8s get first, then week 3 - year 9s etc. Also, does he not let 6th formers/year 11s out for lunch? Surely that would shorten it quite a bit as well.

[iBlueBox]

My old secondary school had the same system as -fire-girl-/laura. Rotate the years round each week. The only difference is that the other years didn't go in the hall. The idea was, you'd queue up if it was your year that was first, the others would be told to "go out and play" until it was their turn to line up and so on. Our lunch break actually ended up an hour as well :D


You don't actually say what the current system is though :P


Oh yeah, sorry xD

The current system at the moment is, that, year 7 go 15 mins early, then everyone else, then everyone practically goes to lunch at 1;20.

And no Right-Wing. Year 11's (my year) is for the same as everyone else, where not aloud out of school grounds. Though Sixth formers are , and they' don't have to line up the queues that just go straight to the front.

[Charlottay!]

In my old high school there were 3 30mins lunch.

the lesson slot was 12:30-2:00
Lunch A would be 12:30 - 1:00 and would then do an hr lesson
Lunch B would be 1:00 - 1:30 and the lesson would be split
Lunch C would be 1:30 - 2:00 and the lesson would be before.

It worked really well as there was a max of two year groups in each lunch slot. We weren't allowed out so this worked best for us.
We also didn't have any lunch time clubs, all this happened after-school

[Catzsy]

Is there a student council that could bring this subject up?

[iBlueBox]

In my old high school there were 3 30mins lunch.

the lesson slot was 12:30-2:00
Lunch A would be 12:30 - 1:00 and would then do an hr lesson
Lunch B would be 1:00 - 1:30 and the lesson would be split
Lunch C would be 1:30 - 2:00 and the lesson would be before.

It worked really well as there was a max of two year groups in each lunch slot. We weren't allowed out so this worked best for us.
We also didn't have any lunch time clubs, all this happened after-school

That's what he sort of wants to do with our school. But many don't want it, As he wants after school activities on till 6PM.

And yes, we have a school council, but they hardly actually change anything, But we've gone straight to him gave him a letter, with some solutions, He recognised, there's a lot of people against the proposal. He said he's willing to look at idea, He's even invited four of us, to a meeting to show our concerns.

The thing is he's an alright man personal, but he's changing a lot of stuff what works fine at the moment he's only been head teacher for less then a year, and in an Ofsted inspection,

The school changed from ''Outstanding'' to ''Satisfactory''

[Accipiter]

Could he not just encourage pack lunches lmfao, or hire extra staff for a new till?

[luce]

Yeah why not just stagger it within lunch and rotate it every day like year 7 first this day 10 minutes later year 8 etc and then rotate it so there are 5 years and 5 days? Also if you miss your slot you just have to wait until the end? There are many ways in solving it rather than doing something that drastic. Like at our school we have detention, homework and clubs to do at lunch and to get rid of it would destroy so much school community because so many clubs would stop as people don't want to stay after school and it's something to keep you occupied at lunch.

[Chippiewill]

My School has a system where you have three lessons and for two of them you'll have a lunch break (So either the first and second or the second and third) and it works out pretty well because all the clubs (..and detentions) can run during the second and people doing those can have lunch at the other times.

[JerseySafety]

We just all go at once; mind you theres only like 3000 students at my school :)

Works fine here!

[Shoe]

At my old school
year 10 would have 1st lesson, 2nd lesson, break, 3rd lesson, 4th lesson, dinner time, 5th lesson, home
Year 11 would have 1st lesson, 2nd lesson, break, 3rd lesson, dinner time, 4th lesson, 5th lesson, home :)

That has always worked...