The school district has once again blessed us with yet another change to the way online schooling works.

Did it somehow manage to make it easier to get into contact with counselors or demand all teachers start posting grades on the same app?

No. Instead, the higher ups at the San Ramon Valley Unified School District deigned to grant us a set of completely unwanted, pointless changes to the bell schedule.

Among these changes was the movement of our lunch period. One might think that they finally decided to change it to a more reasonable time, instead of 11:30 a.m. One would also be wrong.

Instead, in its infinite wisdom, the district saw fit to move the already early lunch period forward by almost half an hour.

Perhaps someone misread the schedule. Perhaps there was a typo. Or perhaps someone was simply under the impression that students desperately wanted to have lunch even sooner after they woke up.

Whatever the case may be, our lunch period was moved from 11:30 to 11:05 a.m.

I know, I know, but try to hold in your cries of outrage. Or don’t. The school board certainly won’t care either way. They never do. The question I’m sure you all have now is “why?”

Well, the reason for this dumpster fire of a schedule change, in part, was the desire to get every student in the district onto the same lunch schedule. A standardized lunch time makes it easier for parents to deal with making food for their kids, and gives siblings at different school levels the opportunity to eat together.

The problem stems from how they went about it. Rather than carefully choosing a time that works best for everyone, the district decided to cripple everyone in the same way and call it a day.

But if the school board’s goal was to unite all of the students in the district, then they certainly succeeded, because I have yet to meet a single individual who supports the change in schedule.

When asked what time she thought would be best for lunch, freshman Numa Patel said, “Maybe 12 or 12:30, because I feel like 11 is breakfast time.”

While Patel makes a fantastic point, the district already beat her to it. In fact they already implemented it last year. Don’t you remember, way back in the day? Lunch used to be at 12:35. I know it’s hard to remember now, but the schedule used to feel sane – reasonable even. What a shame to see how far we’ve fallen.

“I think if they switched third period and lunch, it would make a lot more sense,” senior Jeremy Convento said.

Convento and Patel aren’t alone, either. The vast majority of students actually supported moving the lunch schedule back from its original time of 11:30, not forward.

Well done school board, really nailed that one. You can’t even manage to hobble in the right direction. The specifics of what students wanted varied, though everyone seemed to agree on the idea that “anything is better than this.”

It also doesn’t help that we’re being asked to adapt to all of these changes at once. We’re barely past the first quarter of our first collective year of online schooling, so even small changes like a new bell schedule are going to throw everybody off. How many of you have had people show up late to first period because they forgot we were starting 10 minutes earlier?

Wait, remind me, why are we starting 10 minutes earlier?

Regardless, now we’re expected to eat lunch absurdly early on top of all the other bizarre changes we have to contend with. Just a few months ago, most people weren’t even thinking about lunch at the time we’re supposed to eat now.

“During summer at 11:00, I was actually probably still asleep,” freshman Rebekah Gracer said.

There are, believe it or not, some people who agree with this new schedule. AP psychology and general psychology teacher Brandon Quick says that he actually likes the new lunch schedule, as it allows him to spend lunchtime with his daughter.

But, even he admits that the new system has flaws.

“I think that closer to noon would be more appropriate than closer to 11:00 a.m.,” Quick said.

Ultimately, this most recent schedule change is just another blunder in a long list of mistakes made by the district. Personally, I’m hoping that next time the school board tries to one-up themselves. I’m talking about the total removal of passing periods, starting class at four in the morning, and making lunch the first period of the day.

But until then, we’ll have to settle for our current schedule. I’ll see you all at “lunch”.

If you’re awake, that is.