LIU Post students: Friday classes would be a burden
From left, LIU Post students Brooke Keen, Peyton LaFrenz and Adriana Cecchetti are petitioning against the school's intention to conduct classes on Fridays. Credit: Kendall Rodriguez
Students at LIU Post are pushing back on planned schedule changes that would add classes on Fridays, a significant shift they say will increase burdens on commuters and create scheduling conflicts for those who work.
“It's going to be a massive change for a lot of students,” said Peyton LaFrenz, a sophomore at the university who created an online petition to oppose such changes. “It's just super frustrating.”
A LIU Post spokesman confirmed in a statement that the university plans to offer more options, including a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule.
The university's upcoming fall schedule is “still being finalized and is not yet in publication,” school spokesman Peter Guaraldi said. The university anticipates releasing its fall schedule in early March, he said.
WHAT TO KNOW
- Students at LIU Post are pushing back on planned schedule changes that would add classes on Fridays.
- A petition opposed to the changes has gained more than 1,100 signatures.
Students opposed to Friday classes say they will increase burdens on commuters and create scheduling conflicts for those who work.
"The University plans to offer additional options,” Guaraldi wrote. "A Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule is an example of additional flexibility to an existing Monday-Wednesday class schedule."
The likely changes planned for the fall include adding sessions on Fridays to classes currently held on Monday and Wednesday mornings, according to a faculty union leader. An 80-minute class held twice a week, for example, could be held three times a week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, with a shorter session on each day.
Classes on Fridays at the Post campus account for only about 3% of the more than 1,100 courses listed under the course schedule for the spring semester.
The university did not say how the addition of a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule would affect existing Monday-Wednesday classes.
But the Student Government Association at the Post campus said under the university's plan, "every class that’s offered on Friday will also have another section which will run on the more traditional schedule that students are used to. This means that every class section will still offer a traditional Monday-Wednesday, or Tuesday-Thursday scheduled class," according to a statement emailed by its president, Christian Swidzinski.
Student government leaders said they recommend any student who doesn’t want to or can’t take a Friday class to register early to build their schedule around the classes that don’t run on Fridays.
Wendy Ryden, vice president of C.W. Post Collegial Federation, the faculty union, said while she's unsure if the schedule is definite, "There seems to be every indication that this is happening. The faculty and the students are very much on alert.”
LIU Post, which is in Brookville, enrolled about 5,400 full-time-equivalent undergraduate and graduate students in 2020, according to its financial documents.
LaFrenz, 19, said she first heard about the possible changes from a professor in class on Dec. 12. She was so alarmed that she created a petition in class that day. The petition to oppose the schedule changes, first reported by the campus newspaper The Tide, has gained more than 1,100 signatures.
Ryden, an English professor, said she heard the same planned schedule changes from some department chairs and faculty members.
“We're concerned [that] if we are forced to take a Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule, students will not enroll in that [class] because that's not convenient or not possible for them,” she said.
In recent weeks, Ryden said students have brought up the issue in class and expressed frustration, including one student who said she would leave the school.
"She said: ‘Well, I'm out of here then,’ ” Ryden recalled.
Livia Stachura, 18, a freshman who commutes to class from her home in East Northport, said the proposed changes have provoked a lot of anxiety.
“I’m a broke college student. I can't afford to pay for gas for an extra day every week,” she said.
Ally Perticone, a music education major junior, said she already has classes on Friday mornings but uses the rest of the day to observe music classes in local schools, practice as a member of the equestrian team or pick up shifts at the restaurant where she works as a waitress.
“I feel like it just hinders me from being able to observe, go into schools and start getting experiences early on,” said Perticone, 20.
The common hour, which students use to eat lunch, do homework or meet for club activities, between 12:30 p.m. and 1:50 p.m., is likely to be shortened on certain days as well, according to Ryden and student government leaders.
Students said they oppose cutting the length of the common hour, a move they said would dampen student engagement in campus life.
“This is a school, because of so many commuters, that doesn't really have a campus life,” LaFrenz said. “That's really the only time where everyone congregates and hangs out together as one big university.”
Dandan Zou covers education for Newsday. Previously, she worked for a community newspaper in Maryland and a personal finance magazine in Washington, D.C.
