Students attending most high schools have the option of taking sports during zero or sixth period depending on the type and the availability of that sport, which may result in a difference of waking up, how many academic classes they can take, and the level of exhaustion that they experience while at school.
Sports like basketball and volleyball are practiced during the sixth period when a student’s academic or regular physical education class would be taking place from 2:31 to 3:26 in the afternoon.
On the contrary, sports such as water polo and swim are practiced during zero period before school starts at 6:00 to 7:30 in the morning, followed by students getting ready for school in the locker rooms. But due to the bus system most of the time, students who have a sport during their zero periods are late, causing them to miss their homeroom and sometimes even be late to their first period.
Senior Tabbatha Sanchez stated, “It gets hard waking up every morning during your season and because of the time, a lot of students choose not to join the sport. It also causes you to miss out on class for games and practices that end later. But, those that do end up joining become really close due to the intensity and the timing of the daily training sessions.”
While students who choose to take a support that occurs during sixth period, they may be in a slight restriction of one academic class difference. The student who has practice during zero period may take their total, six academic classes which may possibly allow them to get further ahead if they so wish.
Sports like swimming and water polo are zero period due to the lack of pool, which means that there are no “home games” at Kennedy causing students to miss more periods for games. This is contrary to sixth period games that are capable of having “home games” within the Kennedy school gates.
Sophomore Colin Chong stated, “I don’t really have any negatives to having my sport, basketball during sixth period because it allows me to wake up at a usual time, and it doesn’t take too much from my academics.”
Due to the duration of sleep that students with a sixth period support may miss out on, the timing of the zero period sport may cause the students to have a lack of motivation throughout the day. Studies done on sleep state that one’s ability to learn new things can drop forty percent when sleep deprived.
Both school sport periods have pros and cons regarding the academic leniency that they are able to have whether it be more academic classes or being able to be present during more classes for games.
