Fall break is necessary

Midterms are barely finished, but it seems my work has just begun. Last week, the following were low on my priority list: eating, working and completing homework for the classes I didn’t have midterms in.

Now that the tests are finished, I desperately need a break — a few days off from class, reading — a chance to stay in bed. Unfortunately, IU students don’t have such a luxury.

This next week, I still have the same 400 or so pages of reading to do, not to mention catching up on the reading I’d neglected in favor of studying. I still have assignments to turn in and classes to attend.

There is no time off to relax and rejuvenate before the work begins again. When I took just one Saturday off to enjoy a “How I Met Your Mother” marathon, I regretted it the next day when I was up until 2 a.m. doing my homework.

Many grade schools across the country are switching to year-round systems in which students spend eight to 10 weeks in class and then get three to five weeks off. The more frequent breaks give students “some kind of relief and (allow them to) come back more invigorated,” said Eugene White, Indianapolis Public School superintendent.

I’m certainly not advocating that IU adopt a year-round system, but we definitely need a mid-semester break to rest. For the last three years, I’ve said as much every time spring break rolls around. Many professors schedule midterms the week before, so students have the ability to rest afterward and not worry. After a week off, we can come back in a better frame of mind.

While IU is adopting a two-day fall break next year, it’s not enough. I get we don’t have time to take a full-week break and still have a 16-week semeSter. That’s easy enough to fix: Just add a week to the school year. Our year is short to begin with; Purdue starts and ends classes a full week later than we do.

Some might argue we have Thanksgiving break, but that’s really not the same thing. Thanksgiving is near the end of the semester when we actually need to be at school, finishing final projects and term papers.

For many of us, it’s filled with family and holiday traditions; there’s no time to actually have any rest. We’re starting next fall a full week earlier anyway. Give us an entire week off for fall break so we can get a good rest and come back refreshed for the remainder of the semester.

We’ll be better students if we have a break.

­— hanns@indiana.edu