What is now WIN Time began as Falcon Hour when the school first opened in 2008, providing enrichment and productivity for students. Combining lunchtime and Advisory, students had a full hour to eat, visit teachers for assistance, go to club meetings and socialize.
“We were able to actually take our time and get our lunch when we wanted it,” social studies teacher Lauren Hasenohr, an alumni during the time the school had Falcon Hour, said.
“Students could wait for the lines to die down, go to the library, get help from our teachers and stuff like that,” Hasenor said.
Hasenor said students were also scheduled to certain classrooms if they had lower grades and would stay with that teacher for the first 30 minutes, then be released for lunch the last 30.
“My friends and I would hang out, eat lunch, and work on homework pretty much anywhere in the building,” Hasenor said. “We could just run and ask a teacher a question quickly, too.”
Falcon Hour ended in 2015. One of administration’s concerns was not knowing where individual students were at all times.
“What we need to know is where students are. If a student was called out, we would need to know where they are so that they could leave or get in touch with the office,” principal Larry Smith, Ed.D., said. “It’s just those safety issues and knowing where everyone is.”
During this hour, students could be nearly anywhere in the building with no tracking of their location, making it difficult for administration. It also led to food and garbage being disposed of throughout the building.
“It became a resource barrier on custodial,” assistant principal James Wheeler, Ed.D., said.
At that time, Wheeler was a social studies teacher and coached basketball.
“Lunch was operating from two different locations,” Wheeler said. “The concessions stand and the Great Hall were open, which then meant kids were eating lunch down under the stairs, on the other sides of the school, anywhere.”
And with an open lunch came messes.
“We would find a tray on the floor here and a tray on the floor all the way down the hallway,” Wheeler said.
Lunch crowds were unpredictable, having around 500 students all wanting lunch at the same time. It also allowed grouping and fighting without adults present, Wheeler said. There was a large food fight in the Great Hall in 2013.
“The food fight was the breaking point of it. The week after that, it was over,” Wheeler said.
He said the food fight was planned in advance and caused hours of cleaning.
“Tables were thrown over, kids were hiding behind them, stuff was flying across the room, kids were slipping across the floors,” Wheeler said. “And it was seriously like, ‘Take cover.’”
Administration took the incident seriously and moved to make changes afterward.
“The day after the food fight, our principal at the time, Mr. Mershon, got on the intercom saying, “Yesterday was a dark day in Staley’s history,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler said it became an ongoing joke for staff and students.
“He gave a big address to everyone about how it didn’t represent our core values, SOAR,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler shared the severity of the impact of the food fight, and along with other other issues during Falcon Hour, it had to go.
“Its purpose was to be cool, innovative, thought provoking and purposeful,” Wheeler said. “But in its practicality, we had a lot of issues making it work.”
Current students sometimes wish for more down time during the day, and the thought of Falcon Hour has been brought up. Currently, WIN Time is 45 minutes and doesn’t include lunch.
“There’s a lot crunched into WIN time,” sophomore Olivia Bransfield said. “We only have 45 minutes to work on anything we have to. It would be nice to have more time. The more time we have to work on things together, work on things with our teachers and eat, the more we will be productive.”
“A good work space is different for everyone,” sophomore Ella Whitesel said. “In classes, there’s always going to be something distracting us from work. A little more variety would be nice.”
Some students have more options as far as studying and learning inside the building.
“Everyone is comfortable in their certain area,” Bransfield said. “People can work better in the library, outside, in the hallways, a classroom, with your friends, and I feel like wherever you’re comfortable should be where you’re allowed to work.”
While some students longed for a different WIN Time solution, administration believed there needed to be more controls in place.
“I love the thought and the innovation behind it,” Wheeler said. “The safety issue compared to when it was in effect years ago to now in even that short of time, things are different. It is hard to compromise the safety piece of this, not knowing where every kid is at like we are supposed to.”
He believed the effective part of Falcon Hour is still intact.
“You have 45 minutes three days a week to go work in clubs or go to meetings or go ask questions to teachers,” Wheeler said. “Something that survived was the opportunity to get what they needed in that period of time.”
