Board weighs balanced‑calendar options, outlines survey plan and committee work
Get AI-powered insights, summaries, and transcripts
Subscribe
Summary
School board members reviewed sample balanced‑calendar options, discussed survey design and outreach to students and parents, and agreed to reconvene a committee and include clearer sample calendars and explanatory material in the next survey round.
Bonnie, a board member, opened discussion of the balanced calendar process and emphasized the need to focus outreach and the steps for gathering community input.
District staff summarized options and presented multiple sample calendars adjusted from feedback the board previously provided. Staff said the primary goal is to shorten the long summer break while maintaining academic requirements (90 instructional days per semester where applicable) and protecting AP/test schedules.
Board member Rick proposed focusing the public survey on a small set of clear criteria rather than multiple similar calendar permutations. His recommended criteria included a shorter summer to reduce learning loss, earlier start dates aligned with AP schedules and relatively equal distribution of multi‑day breaks across semesters. Rick suggested two simple survey questions: whether respondents prioritize a shorter summer with more frequent breaks or prefer a traditional long summer, and whether respondents prefer the semester break at winter break or mid–January.
Board members and student representatives emphasized survey clarity for students and recommended providing short explanatory information or in‑class presentations so students can answer informedly; staff agreed to consider delivering the student survey during advisory with a short explanatory video or live Q&A. Board members also recommended providing sample calendars that contrast clearly with the traditional calendar and including results from the prior survey as background.
Board members asked staff to reconvene the balanced calendar committee (Bonnie volunteered to serve) and to return sample calendars and survey wording in time to report preliminary results at the March meeting. District staff acknowledged a scheduling constraint: the negotiated calendar must be provided to the teachers’ association by contract deadlines (the district’s representative indicated February 1 is the formal deadline to supply calendars to the bargaining unit), so staff said they would accelerate the timeline for any final action.