The Clock’s Ticking: A Rush to Sort Out Scheduling Conflicts

With the renovation of last year’s Scheduling Day into this year’s Scheduling Week, II-IV Formers are considering what classes they will take next year, gathering signatures for course approval. For rising V Formers, navigating the course selection can be tough, with seemingly endless options for electives and interdisciplinary courses. Rising V Formers Louise Carroll, Mahika Kasarabada, and Ethan Zhu discussed their thoughts on their impending decisions. Additionally, Antonia Comaniciu ’25 provided insight on her senior year electives.

In pursuit of molecular biology, Zhu planned to enroll in Research in Molecular Genetics (RMG) for the first two terms of the upcoming year. Although he hopes to take certain courses, he worries about the effect of course enrollment capacities on his plans. He also worries about the limited course size for and noted that RMG only had a couple of classes, and that they “randomly selected people.” Zhu also plans on continuing taking Honors Latin next year, but is worried because there will likely be only one section. Reflecting on his II Form Scheduling Day, Zhu remarked that “you don’t have complete control over your courses,” so the experience caused less stress this year. To explore interests as an underformer, he recommended identifying passions and “look[ing] for clubs” or doing “outside research on the topic.”

This year, Carroll took Honors Chemistry, Honors Calculus BC, Honors U.S. History Survey (Survey), and Advanced Spanish. Carroll recalled that Scheduling Week was “certainly a bit intense,” especially for rising V Formers, but she thought of it as “opening and closing doors.” She recommended that if students plan on taking any extremely difficult courses, to “consider taking an easier course in another department.” Carroll highlighted the benefit of challenging yourself, but noted the important “difference between challenges and impossibilities.” As for advice for Underformers, Carroll insightfully recommended to “be open to feedback and advice,” describing how, last year, she initially thought she would take Honors History of American Democracy in Cases, but with peer and teacher advice, she pivoted to Survey and loved it.

In relation to her intended college major, Kasarabada determined that she would “focus [her] coursework and course selections around Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.” These choices fit her plans of going into computer engineering, data science, or something similar in college and beyond. Like many other rising V Formers, Kasarabada struggled to choose courses that both met the graduation requirements and explored her interests. She detailed her struggles with incorporating a history course into her V Form schedule, a necessity as she pushed it off this past year. Considering the difficulties she had faced making scheduling decisions, Kasarabada felt students “should have gotten the scheduling sheet a bit earlier.” Additionally, she believed that the whole approval process was unclear because, for some teachers, “if you get an A-, they won’t approve you for a 500-level course, but others will.” She wished the school “elaborated more clearly on which classes [students] could and could not take.”

As a V Former, Comaniciu was lucky enough to take many electives and highlighted Screwball Comedy, a course mixing English and cinema, as one of her favorite English classes at Lawrenceville. She explained that, through analyzing films such as 10 Things I Hate About You and Clueless, she discovered that one could “learn just as much from movies as from books.” Additionally, Comaniciu felt that Honors French: French Impressionism with Patrick Loughlin was an enjoyable and convenient way to get an interdisciplinary credit. She recommended that IV Formers “who are debating whether to continue French into the Honors level [should] stick with it.” Overall, Comaniciu’s electives enabled her to explore her interests more deeply.

Scheduling Week certainly gave students heavy content to mull over, marking an exciting yet stressful transition into the 2025-26 school year.