Block scheduling was absolutely amazing, and I'm so glad I had access to it. My school did "modified block" with skinny classes (40 minutes) and blocks (85 minute). The only skinny classes were math, music, and foreign language, all of which seem to have a big benefit from going the full year. The concept of trying to do a chemistry or physics lab in 40 minutes sounded awful.

My high school ran from 8:45-3:10. Morning activities were typically 7-8 or 8:15, so you could still drop by teachers classrooms before school started.