With 15 school days missed in a two-week period in the Barnesville Exempted Village and 14 in the Union Local school district as of Friday, Feb. 19, superintendents and board members in both districts are looking at ways to make up the days remaining after five state-allotted calamity days.
Under state law, the school year must be completed by June 30. The school year consists of 182 days -- two for parent/teacher conferences, two for teacher work sessions and five calamity days -- leaving a bare minimum of 173 days.
In the Union Local District, students will already be attending school until June 3. The school year will be extended even longer if more days are missed this week due to expected rain and snow on Sunday and Monday.
Union Local Superintendent Kirk Glasgow presented board members with several options to make up the four days that remained as of Thursday, Feb. 18. Those days were not covered by extending the school year to June 3. The five days forgiven as calamity days are Jan. 4-8. Days to be made up include Jan. 28 --- make up day April 5 and Feb. 8-11 -- make up days June 1, June 2, March 12 (subject to board vote) and June 3.
One of the days students need to make up includes a parent-teacher conference missed on February 11. Rescheduling the conference for March 11 was an option for the board consider. A teacher in-service, missed on February 12, will also need to be made up. Glasgow said on the next school cancellation day, he may ask teachers to report in order to make up the in-service.
With those make up days scheduled, students will still need to make up Feb. 16-18.
Options given by Glasgow included attending school on Saturday, extending the school day by 30 minutes or an hour and using scheduled holiday and vacation days.
Glasgow said he was among the many not in favor of attending school on Saturday.
"It would be expensive (overtime and fueling of buses) and many families have plans," he said.
Adding 30 minutes to each school day was discussed, but it was noted that it would take 10 days to make up one elementary school day and 11 to make up one middle or high school day.
Glasgow said if the school day were extended by one hour (30 minutes for teachers), he would have to enter into a memorandum of understanding with the teachers union.
"I don't see them (the teachers union) bucking this. I really don't," Glasgow said. "I would think they would want to get this (make up days) over with rather than drag it out."
He said if the school day was extended, an after-school program may have to be put in place to accommodate working parents.
Superintendent Glasgow said he received many calls from district teachers and parents with concerns about preparing students for the Ohio Achievement and Ohio Graduation tests to take place in May.
"I'm not going to bring the students back at the risk of their safety," Glasgow said.
On Friday, Feb. 19, the district was operating under a two-hour delay with buses running on the main roads only. Superintendent Glasgow said building principals agreed to be lenient with the attendance policy until the buses were operating on normal routes again.
Glasgow said paperwork is also involved with each calamity day. Board President Stan Sobel reminded board members that the number of calamity days allotted by the state will decrease to three next year and is set to be eliminated the year after. Sobel said the state will also be adding two days to each school year until 20 additional days are added.
In the Barnesville Exempted Village School District, classes were canceled on Friday, Feb. 19., resulting in 15 days to be made up. Lucas said the district was in better shape than others because they began the school year earlier.
At the Thursday, Feb. 18 board meeting, members voted for the option of extending the school day by 60 minutes (30 for teachers). Board members chose that option out of four presented by Superintendent Randy Lucas. The other three options included two other ways of extending the school day and the fourth would have added all the days at the end of the school year, postponing graduation.
The board's decision will still need to be agreed upon by the Barnesville Education Association. Discussions with the BEA president and Lucas began Friday morning.
The board selected an alternate option in case an agreement is not made with the union. The alternative option would extend the student day by 30 minutes and adjust the staff schedule, without increasing total staff time. With that option, teachers would have to work an additional four or five days at the end of the year, according to their contracts which say they must work seven and a half hours for 184 days.
Extending the student school day by 60 minutes would require students to arrive 10 minutes earlier and be released 50 minutes later than usual. The new schedule would begin in March.
The board also approved the use of an alternative bus route to help decrease school cancellations. Students on main roads would be picked up and those on impassable roads would need to meet the bus at another stop. Those students affected will be contacted by the district.
Students who miss school on "alternate bus route" days will be counted as absent.
Students at Barnesville Independent School have also missed 15 days of school, but have already made up two -- one on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and one on President's Day. Students may also make up two days during Easter Break, however, school officials will wait until March to make a formal decision about how the missed days will be made up as more inclement weather is expected.
Comments