Finals week can be a huge part of the end of the semester for many students as they rush to prepare for exams, but a few years ago this school introduced a schedule that, according to administrators, strives to prevent students from taking more than two exams per day, or may allow students not to take a test at all. A.C.E. week was first implemented in 2021 during the hybrid year. Previously, this school had quarter weights, meaning that the first and second quarters of the semester were worth 40% of the total grade, and all students had an exam worth 20% at the end of the year. During the hybrid year, most students only went to school every four days for each class while some students were fully online. This led administration to get rid of the quarter weights. 

Assistant Principal Karen McDaniel said, “We were looking at learning as an ongoing process, and so we got rid of those quarters. We did keep the final exam being of a certain weight, but we (got rid of) the 40/40 split.”  

She said A.C.E. was designed with the idea to give teachers a creative liberty to give students assessments or some sort of culminating activity that reflected what the students learned over the semester. Administrators wanted students to be tested over their knowledge without having to worry about high stakes of the final, causing them to remove the 20% weight of it. 

With the old finals schedule, and even the first year that A.C.E. was implemented, students would often have more than two finals per day, another issue that administrators wanted to avoid. When continuing to develop this new schedule, they introduced Preparation & Intervention time, or P&I time, where students could meet with a teacher or work on their own either in school, at the library or at their home. 

Even with the convenience of the A.C.E. schedule, students like Junior Raya Chauhan said there are still aspects of it students wish to change. Chauhan said, “Honestly, I like the schedule. I think it’s nice that (the finals) are all spread out and with extra time to make up assignments, study or relax. I do wish that we could choose where we sit, instead of like freshmen only in the Freshman Center, seniors only in the library, etc.” 

However, she said she enjoys not having to take more than two finals per day and using P&I time to either study or relax, depending on what finals she has. 

Sophomore Cheryl Yu said she wished A.C.E. week was two weeks before the end of the semester rather than the last week of the semester. 

She said, “I would much rather do exams the second to last week (of the semester) and then just have a few days after to have some relaxing light days in school with our friends because stress levels are always high.”