In a school year that's included Superstorm Sandy and the Blizzard of 2013, maybe it's remarkable that we've only accrued four "snow" days so far. But that does push the school year to Monday, June 24 – within spitting distance of July.
Actually, there have been five "makeup days" this school year, but the district decided to use a November teacher professional development day to make up one of the three Sandy makeup days. That move looks prescient in the wake of the February blizzard, which took another two days. And, truth be told, we got lucky there, since the blizzard started on a Friday, giving the storm two weekend days to wreak havoc.
But some are wondering if there's a different way to deal with weather-related school cancellations, such as extending the school day or taking away some holidays or vacation days. That came up at last week's School Committee meeting, but Supt. Victor Mercurio said Dept. of Education Commissioner Deborah Gist has ruled out certain efforts and changing things such as vacation weeks would require statewide adoption.
So school will last nearly into July this year. Let's just hope another weather event doesn't head our way until next school year ... at the earliest.
Heather Tibbitts
8:31 am on Monday, March 4, 2013
Low hanging fruit: stop using the schools as polling locations. There are plenty of other buildings in town which could serve as polls and not cause us to loose a day day (or 2 for primary election years) out of the school schedule. This has to be changed in the General Assembly, so please contact your State Reps and make some noise! In the meantime, we could align teacher conference day with Election Day.
Norrene McGearu
3:47 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
All polling locations MUST BE in the district that they represent and must be safe and handicap accessible. We hard to keep the cost of elections down for our citizens and therefore we do not and cannot pay about four hundred dollars a day time 5 polling places for elections. Two days a year certainly is not too much!!Norrene McGeary Board of Canvassers
Heather Tibbitts
9:28 am on Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Why would we have to pay? There are a number of municipal buildings, plus churches and soon a synagogue. What about the Parks & Rec building, the Community room at our new police station, Swift Gym (which I think is already in use), etc. My understanding is that having the schools close on Primary Day is a new thing. If so, how do we change it back? I think we need to look at the options. We can accept or reject them, but I do think we (the community) need to have a conversation. I agree we should not have to pay money to rent space, but I think we could come up with options.
Leslie Varone
12:02 pm on Monday, March 4, 2013
How about banking school days in advance? If the school day is extended 15 minutes each day, over the course of the year, the days would be made up
in advance. I don't think going to school in late June is very productive.
Another idea would be having one week off in March instead of a week in Feb and April.
Jennifer Condon
1:49 pm on Monday, March 4, 2013
How about if there is school scheduled on Good Friday and the Jewish jholidays in the fall and students and staff are allowed liberal absence for religious reasons ?
barbara johnson
8:44 pm on Monday, March 4, 2013
Eliminate religious holidays - with an excused absence for those who need it.
Eliminate February vacation and change it to a long weekend with Friday and Monday off for President's Day. Find alternate locations for polling.
Make Veteran's Day a school day and teach the students why that day is important. The school is unnecessarily choppy and long! We will never be able to predict what mother nature has in store for us so we must plan for it.
There seems to be so many options yet it is so difficult to change. Parents, let's band together and start the change!
PT Mom
7:22 am on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Why would "changing things such as vacation weeks require statewide adoption"? I work for one school system and send my children to another, and we have started and ended school on different days every year. Every school district in Rhode Island does not follow an identical calendar. I agree with the common sense of previous comments. Let's band together and call for change that makes sense and not just fall back on the usual, "Well, this is how we've always done it" argument.
Heather Tibbitts
3:14 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Surely there must be more opinions out there! Here we have an open forum for discussing what we'd like to see as options for handling our increasingly frequent hurricane and snow days, yet little participation. We are looking at the possibility of more snow as I write this. What does everyone think? I thought I'd see more comments....
Heather Larkin
3:31 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
While this is a nice forum, I would imagine that participating on the record in the Calendar discussion at a School Committee meeting might yield more of a result.
BTW, I would welcome some changes in the calendar but don't feel strongly about it. We DO enjoy spending the High Holidays and Primary day at the beach!
Elizabeth McNamara
3:51 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
FYI, there is a School Committee meeting tonight at 7 p.m. in the library at Cole. This topic is not on the agenda, so you could address the committee right at the beginning of the meeting.
Heather Tibbitts
9:33 am on Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Agreed, people should attend school committee meetings more frequently (I include myself in that). But this forum is here, so I was interested to see the responses.
Class of 98
6:55 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Here's an idea realize that a Superstorm, election, and blizzard happening all in the same school year is the exception not the norm, and don't make any changes.
barbara johnson
7:22 pm on Tuesday, March 5, 2013
This has been an unusual year but this also has been an ongoing problem. In past years school has been cancelled for extreme heat and cold, flooding, no power, hurricanes, heavy rains, and snow. There is no need to have so many days off throughout the school year.