Really, Ladue? In just the past year, the school has already gone through some drastic changes. There’s a new principal, a new superintendent, and a new School Board president. There were the changes resulting from the highly publicized senior list. There are even new students from Riverview Gardens and Normandy walking the halls in the high school.  On top of all that, Ladue felt that it was rational to extend the school day ten extra minutes.

Really, Ladue? I know the rationale was to make the high school’s start and end times line up with the Fifth Grade Center to maximize efficiency with the buses. I know that adding on those two extra minutes to each lunch should really help students get through the long lines and actually finish their lunches before class starts again. I know that adding two extra minutes to W6 (because of the announcements) will allow the students in that class to not lose precious learning time. I know that these extra ten minutes are so critical to the way Ladue works and that we would fall apart without them.

That was all sarcasm by the way. The truth is that the only thing, positive or negative, that the extra time actually did was make it harder for me to remember when classes begin and end. You’re probably saying that that isn’t much of a tragedy either. And you’d probably be right.

The important thing here isn’t whether this extra time is positive or negative because in reality, it probably will not change life for better or worse for students, teachers, administrators, or the district itself. What is more significant in this case is that change is not always a good thing. Changes aren’t always rational and sometimes don’t yield positive results. Every change, particularly in a school district with many unanswered questions and unresolved problems, needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

I’m just saying.