# schedule

Pronunciation: US say "SKEJ-uul" /ˈskɛd͡ʒʊl/; say "SHEJ-ool" UK /ˈʃɛd͡ʒuːl/, AUS /ˈʃed͡ʒʉːl/

## Noun

1. A plan, often set out as a table, of when activities happen and in what order, sometimes assigning them to people or machines.
   - Simple: A plan showing when things happen, in what order, or who or what does them.
   - _According to the schedule, the conference opens at nine and breaks for lunch at noon._
   - _The construction crew fell two weeks behind schedule after the storm._
3. A systematically arranged list or table of details, especially one attached to a law, regulation or contract.
   - Simple: An organized list or table of details, often attached to a legal document.
   - _Fees payable under the act are set out in Schedule 2._
   - _The contract's third schedule lists the equipment included in the sale._
4. In law, any of the categories into which controlled drugs, medicines, or poisons are grouped, each with its own restrictions, as in the US or Australia.
   - Simple: A legal group that a drug or medicine is put in, which decides how strictly it is controlled.
   - _For decades, cannabis sat in the most restrictive schedule under federal law._
   - _Researchers petitioned the agency to move the compound to a less restrictive schedule._

## Verb

2. To plan or arrange for something to happen, or for someone to do something, at a particular time; to draw up a timetable.
   - Simple: To plan when something will happen, or to give someone a set time to do something.
   - _We need to schedule the inspection before the end of the month._
   - _Organizers scheduled the festival for the first weekend of June._
5. To classify a drug or other substance as a controlled substance under law.
   - Simple: To add a drug to the list of drugs that the law strictly controls.
   - _Congress moved quickly to schedule the synthetic opioid after a wave of overdoses._
   - _The agency scheduled several novel stimulants on an emergency basis last spring._
7. To put a building, monument, or site on an official list, especially one that legally protects it because of its historical importance. *(UK)*
   - Simple: To add a building or place to an official list, often so the law protects it as important to history.
   - _Archaeologists are urging officials to schedule the Iron Age hillfort before the quarry expands._
   - _Because the burial mound has been scheduled, any digging on the site needs special consent._

## Noun

6. A slip of paper on which a short note or memorandum has been written. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: A small piece of paper with a short note written on it.

## Other meanings

- (verb) To commit someone to a hospital against their will, using the powers set out in a schedule of the relevant mental health law.

## Origin

This word came into Middle English as cedule from Old and Middle French, which took it from Late Latin schedula, a diminutive of scheda meaning "papyrus strip." That Latin word traces back to Ancient Greek σχέδη (skhédē, "papyrus leaf") and ultimately to a Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to divide, split." The pronunciations with /ʃ/ and /sk/ arose from the written form, since the word was historically pronounced /ˈsɛdjuːl/.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/schedule (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).