"Roundtable is Not Meant to Be a Waste of Time"

On Nov. 17, a group of students proceeded to go into the day's roundtable activity: a career talk with a Michigan State Police Marine Service Commander. It was part of a series that takes place throughout the year, made possible because of roundtable, a new period instituted last year, which has not been without controversy.

Roundtable was designed to be a small, intimate group of students gathered together for school-sanctioned events or additional time to do work. As the school has expanded programming during this time, including guest speakers, seminars and college-prep events, there is a lot of discussion between students and faculty about how this time should be used. 

“Roundtable was created to alleviate a lot of the pressure that our schedule felt from all the things we do outside the classroom,” Assistant Head of Upper School Matthew Lapolla said. 

Head of Upper School Shernaz Minwalla noted that roundtable is meant to introduce students to opportunities that could help them after they finish school. She acknowledged that there has been pushback from students, but, she said, “We have another push from the community: to create opportunities for our students to learn more about what's out there in the job force.” 

Roundtable occurs on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with sessions scheduled morning,  midday, or at the end of the school day. Documents provided to the Ligg showed that the number of scheduled events across all four grades increased from 53 last year to 67 this year. Events were counted separately when multiple grades attended the same event, so the total number of scheduled events during roundtable periods was somewhat lower.

The junior dean, Elizabeth Krymski, is one of many faculty members who schedules and coordinates the activities of the roundtable. She said roundtable is “a joint effort between Mr. Lapolla and the deans office, as well as anyone who is involved with programming at University Liggett School” 

Scheduling roundtable starts early. Faculty members meet at the end of the year and plan all of next year's roundtable schedule. A spreadsheet is created, and faculty fill open times in the schedule to plan events beneficial to the students. Krymski noted that faculty leave some flexibility in the schedule to account for accommodations such as alumni speakers or snow days.

Justin Gibson, a junior, said, “I feel like the ratio for study hall to planned events should be 50-50.” He argued the increase in scheduled events this year limits his work time. 

Another student, Ollie Cooley said, “I wish they would realize that, some of the time, certain stuff is not always super helpful to us.” 

He emphasized that if the school provided a variety of options he would enjoy that and find it easier to balance his schedule and work.

Charlie Laethem, a junior, said if guest speaker events provided a different approach to teaching the students, they would be more engaged. He said that there are “different ways of learning” for all students. 

Minwalla seemed open to splitting individual roundtable periods between programming and study hall, explaining that this could benefit both teachers and students. 

Many students have asked for more study hall time, but Minwalla emphasized that the roundtable is there to prepare students for the future and expand their ideas regarding careers. “Roundtable is not meant to be a waste of time.” she said. 

Offering a possible solution, Krymski provided insight on the issue when she suggested students could fill out a “suggestion survey”  or “temperature gauge” of  how roundtable programming is going.

Lapolla said that in the past two years, roundtable has been a “huge success,” although, he said, “scheduling is always challenging.”

Minwalla said, “This is part of the problem with planning, right? Is that you're never going to make everybody happy.”