Agenda:

• Give us Reading Days before finals
• Extend library hours before and during finals week 

Main points:

• Reading Days are a couple of days before finals where no classes are scheduled to provide students with time to prepare for finals exams.
• The last week of classes is extremely busy, so providing a couple of extra days after classes is important to give students enough time to study for finals.
• We currently have a 14-week class schedule, instead of the usual 15 week semester. Therefore, it would not be difficult to continue a 14 week semester and use the 15th week for Reading Days.
• Extending library hours before and during finals week would benefit many students who are spending extra hours studying.

Reading Days are a couple of days before finals where no classes, clubs, or activities are scheduled to provide students with time to review, study, and prepare for finals exams.

Many Universities utilize Reading Days to allow their students the proper time to prepare for finals after classes end. Many top schools like Harvard, Yale, and the University of California Berkeley are among many.

It is not ideal for students to have to take a final the week immediately after class ends. The last week of classes is often the busiest week of the entire semester, with final projects, exams, and student showcases all happening at once. This leaves no extra time for the students to begin preparing for finals.

 For example, this semester, the dance showcase was on the Friday and Saturday before finals. The last week of classes was spent practicing the choreography, and the weekend was spent performing. On top of that, they have to juggle final projects and midterms. This leaves very little time for the dancers to prepare for finals, and they may be forced to choose between dance or their grades. 

Having very little time to study for finals is extremely stressful, especially when one may be forced to drop club activities to make time for studying. Stress is strongly linked with depression, which sadly is something Carnegie Mellon is well known for. Out of thousands of colleges in America, Carnegie Mellon is ranked 3rd for the most depressed student body. Giving Reading days is one of the many ways Carnegie Mellon could relieve the stress on their students and reduce their drastic depression rate.

This year, Carnegie decided to implement a 14-week class schedule instead of the usual 15 week semester. Therefore, it would not be difficult to continue running on a 14-week class schedule, and have the 15th week be Reading days. 

Other requests:

Have the libraries open for longer before and during finals week. This includes having Hunt library open until midnight on all nights the week before and during finals week. Many students will be spending extra hours studying, especially on the weekend, and would benefit from extended hours.

Extend the 3 final rescheduling rule from 25 hours to 48 hours. The current rule is that if you have 3 finals in the span of 25 hours, you may reschedule one. This is terrible, because if you have 2 finals Monday, and then a third final Tuesday afternoon, you are not allowed to reschedule, and left with very little time to study for the Tuesday final. Extending the time period to 48 hours would ensure that no students will have to take 3 finals in the span of two days.

Sources:

https://humansofuniversity.com/university-life/top-50-colleges-with-the-most-depressed-student-bodies/

https://registrar.fas.harvard.edu/harvard-college-academic-calendar

https://covid19.yale.edu/community-messages/plans-spring-semester

http://guide.berkeley.edu/academic-calendar/

https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2019/april/life-at-cmu-project.html