Introducing Flex Block

With North and South Brunswick High Schools introducing the new Flex Block, West is the last traditional school in the county without one.

Brunswick County Schools held stakeholder meetings in late November, developing a strategic plan for the next five years with the help of a third party company. Some topics of discussion at the November 29th high school student meeting included focusing on CTE classes, student pride, dual enrollment classes, and more. Despite the multitude of great ideas and areas of concern being floated, the dominant discussion point was the Flex Block, a concept allowing students to have time for tutoring, clubs, homework, and just recuperation during the school day.

Flex block allows students time to focus on their clubs and other activities when their grades are up. This is a good opportunity to remove barriers for student engagement, allowing students who can’t stay after school for extracurricular activities a chance to still be active in their school community. Principal Scott Dalton was familiar with the concept, having followed a similar model at a prior school.

“It gives students extra support to improve their grades and extra things they are struggling with,” said Dalton. “It also gives students a little bit of fun during the school day because some might not have rides home.”

With flex block, students have some free time to improve their grades and teachers can improve their connection with students.

“You can choose any class or club you want,” said North Brunswick freshman Madalyn Webb. “The teachers set up clubs in their classrooms, and you pick a club you’re interested in, for example board games or cellphone happiness.”

A lot of students get overwhelmed because they have to go from class to class without getting a break. A schedule change like the one proposed would help kids look forward to school and not always dread their school experience.

“I feel like it could help me because it would give us an extra 30 minutes to sit down and do some extra assignments I could have done the night before for homework,” said freshman Brayden Bell. “If I need to study, I can do that too to improve my grades.”

Some people have different opinions when it comes to flex block: will it be more distracting than helpful to the student coming into high school? Will students take advantage of it as a time to improve or as a time to goof off?

“I think they will be able to manage their time better and get done with work they have been struggling with,” said senior Grace Gundrum. “After school, I dance from 3 pm – 10 pm, so I think having time during the day to just get my work done and go visit my clubs and pay my dues helps me.”

West Brunswick has been visiting advisory more often this year in hopes of creating an environment similar to a flex block. Advisory starts after first period and goes on for about 30 minutes, allowing students to have extra time to catch up on work and to just get extra information from the school.

“We would like to try to move in that direction (adding flex block) and work together as a school to make it happen,” said Dalton. “Although it’s a goal, we don’t know what it’s going to look like yet.

About the Contributors

Jordan Thomas, Content Creation Member

Jordan Thomas is a 15-year-old sophomore, who is currently in his second semester of journalism. Thomas was born in Orlando, Florida and spent most of his childhood there but he eventually moved to North Carolina at 9 years old. “The weather here is definitely way nicer. I like it because it's not always that hot and it's not always raining.” said Thomas Thomas is also a student-athlete, who currently plays travel baseball outside of school. He has been playing baseball for about 5 years. ”I made the all star team 2 years ago.” When Thomas is not playing baseball, he likes to spend his free time playing video games with friends or listening to music. Thomas enjoys listening to R&B and rap. “I feel like those genres get me through life.” When asked about his plans for the future Thomas replied enthusiastically. “I want to be a sports journalist. I want to be able to interview the players and write a little bit of articles about them.” Although those are his plans now, they have not always been. “It's a new thing. When I was in eighth grade, I wanted to do it, but before that I played baseball, so that was probably my dream.” The West Wind first sparked Thomas’ interests when he first saw a Tiktok at the beginning of his freshman year. “I was in it last year and I wanted to come back because it was really fun and I get to go for my dreams.” Thomas’ goal for this semester is to achieve all A’s. “I want to get all A’s. I'm trying, or just A’s and B’s. That's fine too.”

Aniston Mclamb, Staff writer

Aniston McLamb is a 16-year-old sophomore. She was born in Loris, SC but grew up in Supply. Just recently, she moved to Ash where she lives with her parents and little sister. Mclamb is now going on her 11th year of dancing for “Simply Dance” in Whiteville. Her parents put her in dance at the age of five, and her love grew quickly. Her favorite style of dance is hip-hop because it is up-beat and allows her to let loose. “Dance is my escape,” said McLamb. “Whenever I am dancing I feel like all my problems go away–the studio is my happy place.” This is McLamb’s first semester in journalism. She wanted to join the class because she was in search of something new. She wanted to take a class that is interactive with the school and a class that keeps her busy. “I joined journalism because I was interested in the social media aspect of the class,” said McLamb. “I have seen Tiktoks on my ‘for you’ page of the class and it seemed like something I wanted to get involved with.” Outside of the West Brunswick walls, McLamb found an interest in attending and competing in pageants. She has been doing pageants avidly since she was two years old thanks to the support from her mom and the rest of her family. “I recently won the Fair Bluff Watermelon Festival Teen Miss,” said McLamb. “Pageants are going to stay consistent in my life, and I don’t think I’ll be stopping soon.” McLamb plans on going to UNC Chapel Hill. She hopes to pursue a career as a General OB/GYN. She has been thinking about going into this field since middle school. “I have wanted to go to UNC Chapel Hill since forever,” said Mclamb. “Going there has always been a dream of mine. If Chapel Hill doesn’t work out, my goal is to go to another college with a good medical program.”