Churchland High School’s daily “Trucker Hour” was ended by Covid and, unfortunately, has never returned.
Instead of going back to the full Trucker Hour, a new “Trucker Friday” was announced at the beginning of the school year, but we still haven’t seen one be implemented, and students are wondering why.
English Department Chair Mrs. McEwen explained how Trucker Hour used to work. “It was a full hour. So, during that hour, you ate lunch and you could attend a club meeting or go to a study hall or go to a tutoring session or something else that you might not have been able to do after school,” she said.
Teachers like her helped to manage and organize Trucker Hour when it was going strong. And, though she thought it was a great idea, she did point out some faults.
“You have to get 100% buy-in from everyone,” McEwen explained. “So some kids didn’t want to go to a club or whatever, but then we were told they couldn’t wander the halls so then there’s a conflict there.”
Many students now, though, sound like they’d be interested in an event similar to what Trucker Hour was.
“I think we’ve seen first hand how just like- just fun times can really boost the energy and morale of the school and I think that’d be great,” student Eavan Coady said in favor of Trucker Hour’s return.
Some students, like Coady, didn’t even have the opportunity to experience Trucker Hour when it was still in place, though that hasn’t deterred her from the idea.
“I never had it. But I’ve seen, like with the music in the cafeteria and everything, I’ve seen what it can do for the students,” said Coady.
Some other teachers, who also didn’t experience all that Trucker Hour was, think the same.
“That style of having a, almost like a study hall or a break period for students can be really beneficial, but only if it’s implemented well,” Mx. Kassel commented.
Even though they didn’t work at Churchland at the time, they said that they have seen similar things work in other districts and think it could work well for Churchland, too.
“I have seen it work really well in places that were bigger than this and very similar to this. I used to work in Newport News, and so I know it can be done,” Kassel said.
Though all of the people interviewed on the topic agreed that it would be a good morale boost for the school; however, they didn’t agree on the reason why we haven’t seen a Trucker Hour thus far.
“I think probably more of the reality is it’s difficult to justify to the state standards of accreditation how we can lose an hour of instructional time every single day,” Kassel suggested.
They thought that, because students have to be in a classroom for a certain amount of time to get credit for the class, doing Trucker Hour every day just isn’t feasible.
“I think it was a privilege that was taken away because of how some students were acting. But I think that that privilege shouldn’t be denied to all the students,” Coady guessed.
Most of Churchland’s students have been under the impression that behavior has been the reason why Trucker Hour, and now Trucker Friday, have been more a myth than something that we will ever actually experience. McEwen, on the other hand, disagreed.
“I don’t want to say [Trucker Hour] got forgotten, but it just kind of fell off to the wayside,” McEwen explained.
With Trucker Hour being mostly forgotten and now Trucker Fridays being cast aside, we may never see it. Many may agree that the idea could be useful, and may even have ideas for it, but from the looks of things, it just doesn’t seem to be in the cards for Churchland’s 2023-2024 school year.
Photo Credit: Victoria Farrow
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