Good ole'fashioned theater at a school board meeting creates good blogs...this is no different.Apparently, there's now a school calendar controversy, and it is creating chaos down on Eugene Street as school brass go back to the drawing board with next year's calendar; this following a stinging rebuke by DPI officials telling GCS that the District is breaking state law if it mandates sending kids to school after June 10.
Will they be handcuffed? Bail amounts? Let the jokes start flying...because, my friends, this is ridiculous.
Let's recap...the makeup days were instituted following last week's late-season snowstorm, which closed schools for two days straight. Because of the nature of this year's calendar, makeup days built in at the end of year were now in play, they were previously end-of-year teacher workdays, which are usually reserved for final grades, classroom clean-outs, and end of year shut-downs.
Reports surfaced late yesterday, according to the News & Record, that DPI sent a letter to GCS, informing them that the end of year makeup days are out of compliance.
The issue took center stage at last night's Board meeting, with Chairman Alan Duncan accusing DPI of crafting the rules that created this mess in the first place, and Board member Jeff Belton accusing DPI of being illegitimate.
N&R:
Duncan said the school system finds itself in the position because the Department of Public Instruction supported a bill pushed by tourism lobbyists that restricted school calendars.
"DPI supported that, DPI did that, DPI is not looking out for our students," Duncan said.
Paul LeSieur, DPI's School Business Department director, said school boards can extend the school year beyond June 10, if they have no other options.
Board member Jeff Belton questioned LeSieur's authority to even write the letter, calling it an "illegitimate opinion."
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More from the article:
Students currently are not scheduled for class on March 30, a teacher workday, April 13-17, for spring break, and May 25, Memorial Day. LeSieur said students also can attend class on Saturday.
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Take a note from Alamance County, in which their students this past Saturday were in school. Matter of fact, that system reported an 82 percent attendance rate for Saturday classes, according to the Burlington Times-News:
...Alamance-Burlington School System spokeswoman Caron Myers said the attendance rate for Saturday's make-up day was 82 percent.
"I was talking to an algebra teacher (Saturday) and she said she had a 100 percent rate in her class," Myers said. "She said she couldn't remember having a 100 percent rate before."
That's a high percentage rate considering the day and the weather.
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But Saturday classes may not fly with the rank-and-file in Guilford County.
GCAE head Mark Jewell tells the N&R:
"I don't think Saturday is going to be a viable option," said Mark Jewell, president of the Guilford County Association of Educators.
Jewell said Saturday is a day of worship for several faiths and many teachers work second jobs on the weekend. He said he sees little option other than taking days from spring break.
*****************************So it all goes back to how we got ourselves in this mess...and how it can be prevented in the future?
I think part of the answer should be letting school systems decide their calendars, not DPI, not bureaucrats in Raleigh, and definitely not lobbyists for the state's lagging tourism industry mandating when our children should be in school and when they shouldn't. This is a case here where local control works best, not Raleigh bureaucrats.
N&R:
Should the school system decide not to comply it would be the first incidence of this, according to LeSieur. The ramifications of which aren't clear.
"We've not had a school district that's not complied, but if they did (not comply) we'd have to take that to the state board," LeSieur said.
LeSieur said Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools and McDowell County Schools are being presented with the same letter as well as a third school system he could not recall.
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This one even stumped paid-by-the-hour attorney Jill Wilson, who suspects the state has no case.
N&R:
School board attorney Jill Wilson said state law is too vague on the matter.
"There's no clear guidance on the statute," Wilson said. She added the state has not issued the same letter to other area school systems operating on similar calendars, including Rockingham County, which Wilson also represents - and Winston-Salem/Forsyth County.
The state statute provides that, "A local board may revise the scheduled closing date if necessary in order to comply with the minimum requirements for instructional days or instructional time."
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And then the other angle...what drives the days at the end of the year? Exams...yep, it's all about those EOCs/EOGs/high stakes tests. And yes, it was a bone of contention during a heated vote.
N&R:
Several motions were made, remade, failed and withdrawn before the board agreed on the motion. The motion to leave the makeup days as they are failed originally but won after board members Deena Hayes and Carlvena Foster changed their votes to support it.
Board Chairman Alan Duncan, Vice Chairman Amos Quick and board member Sandra Alexander voted against the motion. They argued that if having makeup days is truly about making up lost education then the make up days should occur prior to end of course exams. Makeup days, as scheduled by the board last fall, that would meet this criteria would be the last three days of spring break — April 15-17.
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Will the testing schedule be changed? State law mandates precisely when these high stakes tests must be administered, almost down to the hour.
And seeing some of the preliminary comments on the N&R will almost certainly provide fuel to this debate, for this one is not over:
If we have to make up those dates in a different manner, I think that the way Burlington-Alamance County handled the make-up days would be the best for most families...
...The way it falls this year, most companies use Good Friday (this is the Friday before Easter) as a Holiday, and the GCS is scheduled to be in class. Why can't the School Board do anything right?...
...I personally am a teacher, and many teachers have plans for spring break too, so you can count on a lot of subs in the buildings if that is what is forced by the state...
...Extending school to June 15 means bringing back on Monday after a weekend. If EOC's are completed on Friday, June 12, then this will be a wasted day.
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Stay tuned...
E.C. :)
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1 comment:
I'm not of the tourism lobby. I don't own a timeshare. Heck, I'm a working guy who rarely ever takes a vacation day. But I whole-heartedly support the school calendar law AS IT IS WRITTEN. Simply put, my two superior-achieving sons benefit mightily from having an extended and decent summer break. Frankly, it gives them time to detoxify from all the crap they face in the confines of the classroom and system operated by Guilford County. Having been educated myself in the old "Greensboro City Schools," I can assure you that the now sacrosanct "spring break" used to consist of Easter Monday holiday. If a spring break can be worked into the calendar, great. But to make it an untouchable entity is just plain stupid. The truth is that a few years back the school year got SERIOUSLY extended (that is, the 180 days of instruction went from the first days of August through mid-June of the next year) because of several factors. One was a proliferation of teacher work days that frankly are not all necessary. As a former classroom teacher of eight years, I confidently state that. Most of those workdays became nothing more than edu-drivel sessions for experts to spread what they don't know to people who already know. It is also true that other "holidays" and extraneous days were deposited throughout the calendar to extend the school year. Note that the 180 days of instruction never varied...only how long it took to accomplish those 180 days of instruction. And I'll go further, in our experience, the last couple of weeks of school are a JOKE. Once those end-of-year/end-of-course/AP tests are taken, that's pretty much it, baby. It's then time to pull out the videos and have yearbook signing parties. There may be exceptions, but I'm stating it as I have observed it for the high schools my sons have attended.
One last thing. From my perspective, the necessity of a statewide school calendar law might have been avoided IF local school boards had simply listened to what parents like me had to say and given us consideration. Instead, they were little bobble-heads who were polite and then just ignored us. I had a very interesting Sunday afternoon phone conversation with the chairman of the Guilford County board a few years back. He called me as the result of an e-mail I sent all board members when they a) came out against pending legislation for a state school calendar law and b) once again set calendar dates earlier-to-start and later-to-end. "Mr. Williams," he told me, "I can tell just from talking with you that you are a good parent. The problem is, we have a lot of parents who aren't good parents. That's why we need to have those students longer." Well, if some students need to be in the classroom longer, let them be there. That should NOT be a forced edict for all. If Terry Grier showed us nothing else it was that we can create a special school setting at the drop of a hat for every constituency that comes along. There are many, many students (mine included) who do just fine (no, they don't do fine, they flourish) if they start school around Labor Day and end in early June of the next year. It doesn't matter when you give them exams. My boys have learned lessons they will never begin to learn in the GCS classrooms... during the summer when they attend camps and embark on faith-based service projects. When they pleasure-read classic works of literature that are no longer introduced in the classroom. When they connect with friends and family. When they learn what it means to WORK at a real job, punch a time clock and earn money for "wants" as well as to build funds towards future education. Oh yes, and to just kick back, play, travel, be outdoors and have FUN. Give me a school system and board that will have open eyes and ears, not one that is so inbred that it sees only itself and the bureaucrats of educational whim and fantasy.
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