Consequences of More Snow Days
On Friday, the Manchester School District was closed for the 5th day this school year. With the polar vortex still rearing its ugly head, many administrators, teachers, and parents are a little worried. Will we miss more school days, and if so, will we (and how will we) have to add more days to the school year to meet state requirements?
Under the State School Aid Act, schools must meet a minimum number of days and hours of pupil instruction to qualify for State aid. For Manchester, that magic number is 1,098 hours or 170 days. A school district that fails to meet the minimum hours will incur a reduction in State aid. The act does allow for six days to be missed due to severe storms, infrastructure problems, or health conditions. Naturally, instead of taking a cut in state aid, school districts would rather make up the time that is missed.
So far, we’ve missed four days due to the weather and one day due to the bus vandalism. Our district has one more day that can be missed without penalty or having to make up lost time. In previous years, adding more days at the end of the school year was the only option. Last May, an amendment was enacted to the State School Aid Act which grants some flexibility to school administrators.
Under this bill, school administrators have the option of expanding the length of a school day by minutes in order to make up lost time, rather than expanding the length of the school year by days. For instance, the district could add 10-15 minutes on to each remaining day, rather than adding full school days to extend the school year further into the month of June. The bill was introduced in the Senate and then presented in the House as House Bill 4471.
Bill 4471 passed the House with flying colors, with 106 voting for it and only 1 voting against it. The Mirror contacted Representative Gretchen Driskell for a comment on why the bill was so popular. In response, Representative Driskell indicating that she voted in favor of the bill because “it allows school districts more local control over the way that they want to make up for time lost to poor weather conditions or other unavoidable school closures.”
Why do this? There are a number of reasons why adding minutes rather than adding days would be beneficial. It is possible that adding days could interfere with family vacation plans, student summer athletics programs, or other events (i.e. scouts, dance, camps, etc.). The potential for a low turnout of students also increases as the school year becomes longer. This could also jeopardize district funding, since a 75% attendance rate is required to count the day towards the number required to qualify for State aid, ultimately defeating the purpose of adding days to begin with.
Further, there is an economic impact of extending the school calendar by days. There is added cost for the extra days of transportation, operational costs of the buildings, and providing lunches for the students, to name a few. (There will be staff salary costs associated with either choice, but the amount would vary depending on method.)
It is difficult to ascertain the impact to Manchester families. Would extending the day by 10 or 15 minutes create difficulties? Would there be a difference in picking up your child, or waiting for him/her to get off the bus? It makes a difference if a parent or student is trying to make it to work or a class immediately after school, otherwise, maybe not.
There are strings attached for the district however. If Manchester were to add minutes to each day rather than adding days to the end of the year, the district would be required to create a report which eventually would be sent to the senate and house standing committees on education. The report would include 1) details on the amount of instructional time that was lost due to school closures 2) the amount of additional instructional time that was added to compensate, 3) when the additional instructional time was provided, 4) the activities that were carried out, 5) subject areas addressed during the additional instructional time, and 6) other information required to assess whether appropriate instruction occurred during the additional instructional time.
In speaking with Superintendent Vannatter, she is unsure what method she will use to make up time if Manchester misses more than six days of school. She said that it would depend on how far into the school year the district exceeds the allowable six days of closures. She will evaluate the number of minutes needed versus the amount of days remaining in the school year to determine if adding minutes to the school day is a viable option. Otherwise, she will be forced to add full days at the end of the school year. As superintendent, she has to weigh the financial impact to the district versus the interests of the parents, students, and staff. With the polar vortex still looming, we may know the answer sooner rather than later. Stay tuned…
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