Menlo has now been completing school from home for over a month. The planet has been asked to stay home during this unprecedented time, shifting the school experience tremendously.

Because of the shelter-in-place order passed by most states, schools across the world have canceled in-person classes. Menlo students, like many others around the world, have been using online video chats to complete their classes.

According to Menlo students, teachers have been very responsive and are making the transition to distance learning much easier. Menlo teachers have always been great with emails, which is coming in handy during this situation according to Menlo students. 

Sophomore Brynn Brady believes that this communication is vital. “We have had less time to ask them specific questions,” Brady said. Because each class only meets once a week, it could be easy to get confused, but most students at Menlo speak highly of their teachers’ response to distance learning.

However, there has been some confusion regarding what platforms are being used. Different platforms include Google Classroom, Haiku, Gmail, and more. Many classes are using multiple platforms at once, which can make it difficult to find the work that needs to be done. “Pretty much each of my classes is different and it gets confusing with where to check,” freshman Samantha Sellers said. Because there has been a lot of confusion regarding where to turn in work, teachers have begun to relax their late policies.

Another issue that has arisen for students is the three-hour block schedule. While having a set time to work on one class has been beneficial, some teachers are choosing to have Zoom calls or Google Meets with no breaks. “While most of my teachers don’t use the entire three hours for class, some do, and it gets hard to stay focused after a while,” Junior Jacob Halabe said. 

According to the Washington Post, being online for long periods of time is harming students and makes it very difficult to get work done and to focus for the entire class. It is more productive for teachers to be “giving us work to complete by the next class to do at our own pace,” Sellers said.

Overall, students are very pleased with how Menlo is handling the situation. “I honestly can’t think of anything we could be doing better; we’re making the most of what we can,” senior Sidney Peña said.