By Cullen Cosme ‘21

The year 2020 has been like no other. Some schools are going back to school full-time while others are full e-learning. At Brother Rice we are doing a bit of both with our hybrid schedule. The students have been broken up into two groups with one group learning in school while the other learns via Zoom or Google Meet.

For as nice as it is to be back in school, it still stinks that not everybody can be there at once.

Senior Andy Sloyan said, “I like the hybrid schedule because it is great to be back in school with my friends. Learning from home is not the same as being in person and interacting with others. If I could change one thing about hybrid, it would be mixing up the groups in the second semester so that we can see other students who aren’t there the same days as us.”

Having to learn from home some days can cause troubles for many students. The first issue is remembering all of the materials needed for learning at home the following day. For some students, working at home can be hard to find a quiet place to work because of family members.

Senior Brennan O’Malley said, “Personally, I do not enjoy the hybrid schedule, but I am glad to be back in school. One thing that I would change is less time on Zoom at home because it is difficult to concentrate and instead more hands on activities.”

Teachers try their best to limit the amount of screen time for students at home, but it is challenging. In order to get the full learning experience students often find themselves in front of the computer longer than they’d like, but it is a necessary evil.

Many students are grateful for all the work being done by the faculty and staff to ensure safety during the pandemic. Senior Grant Matern said, “I would really like to have school every day, but in these tough times it is at least supplemented by some in school learning rather than none at all.”

The hybrid schedule has given the students a chance to interact with friends at school at least twice a week, three times if you’re lucky enough. For many of us we enjoy rolling out of bed and being able to open up class on the computer. Yet, it is not as fun of getting to go to school every day and seeing all of our friends. Things are not normal right now, but hopefully sometime soon we can return to school together as one.