Advisory was created and put into effect by PCS in order to give students a teacher and 45 minutes a week in order to talk and learn about subjects not covered in classes. Last year, a plan was given to all teachers that they were told they should follow yet they were allowed to deviate from but this year, no such plan was created. This year, most advisories have turned into tutorial time where students have time to do work yet can’t leave to go to work with other teachers or students.

Some advisories have turned into periods where the teacher brings up any topic they want to talk about and hold a conversation with their students–which is close to the actual purpose of advisory. While other advisories constantly watch videos or play trivia according to the desires of the teachers.

One example of a big change in advisory is the 9th grade combined advisory efforts. Every other week in 9th grade, all the advisories gather together outside to do physical activities for the whole period–like an extended exercise break that happens during block classes. This is a good use of advisory time compared to extra study hall time but it is still far from covering non-school related topics in a classroom.

Even though I enjoy having the extra homework time, as most students probably do, since it is what the majority of advisories do, shouldn’t we just turn it into another day of tutorial?

Unless we change the purpose of advisory back the having conversations or watching educational videos about non-school related subjects, the advisory period is better off being another tutorial.