Finals are quickly approaching at Rancho Cucamonga High School, and students are starting their studying process. Final exams will take place from Wednesday, Dec. 15 to Friday, Dec. 19, marking the end of the first semester of this school year.
Unlike previous school years, this year, RCHS has a finals schedule on a Friday. Previously, finals for RCHS started on the Tuesday of the last week of the semester and ended on Thursday. This year, however, finals are set to start on a Wednesday and end on a Friday. This is unusual, and according to Ms. Stacy Ransdell in the Activities Office, it hasn’t happened in over ten years.
The current finals schedule includes two periods each day: Wednesday will be periods one and four, Thursday will be periods two and five, and Friday will be periods three and six. Each day of final exams will run on a traditional final exam schedule with the first final taking place from 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m., and the second final starting at 10:50 a.m. and ending at 12:50 p.m.
During the usual school week schedule, Fridays are a late start for students, meaning that school starts at 9:30 a.m. However, during finals week, Friday is set to start at the normal 8:30 a.m. time for final exam schedules.
Each period lasts for exactly two hours. There is a short nutritional break for 12 minutes between the finals.
This slight change in schedule allows students to have an extra day of cramming for finals and for teachers to have an extra day to prep their tests and assignments. Junior Mia Alcala said that the slight extension will give her more time to prepare and study for her finals.
“Last year we only had one day within the week to study,” Alcala said. “But I think [the extra day] will become more useful to ask my teachers questions.”
The change in this year’s final exam schedule is because of the four-day weekend from Veterans Day. From Nov. 8-11, the Chaffey Joint Union High School District had a four-day weekend for Veterans Day. Even though the students were excited about a long break from school, the extra day off on Monday, Nov. 10 was placed at the end of the semester.
Activities Director and English teacher at RCHS, Ms. Heather Landau, said that the district made this decision most likely because there is a certain number of school days the high schools must have. Each year, the CJUHSD calendar includes 180 instructional days.
“It is a district decision for all of our schools,” Landau said. “We do have to be at school for a certain amount of days.”
In good news, according to Landau, students can expect the second semester to end like usual on a Thursday, specifically Thursday, May 21, 2026.
