Curriculum committee reviews calendar change, new middle-school program of studies and math alignment; multiple software and dual-credit items set for March 17

At a combined curriculum committee meeting, Bethlehem Area School District staff presented multiple instructional items and scheduled several purchases and agreements for the March 17 board meeting.

Discussion items included an academic-calendar change and a districtwide middle-school program of studies. District staff said the one substantive calendar change proposed for 2025-26 converts planned three-hour late-start days for secondary schools into early-dismissal days so secondary teachers have time to prepare report cards and assessment-related tasks while minimizing unintended elementary attendance impacts. The presenter said bargaining-unit representatives had been consulted and indicated they were amenable to the change.

Staff unveiled a single middle-school program of studies intended to standardize course descriptions, intervention/enrichment structures and transition practices across the districts four middle schools. The program centralizes common information for parents and teachers, standardizes language across schools and preserves individual schools' unique offerings. Amanda Miranda, identified in the presentation as a program-of-studies lead, described a daily intervention/enrichment period (branded by each school's mascot) that groups students for reading intervention, math intervention or enrichment and is reexamined at midyear using assessment data.

On middle-school math, staff said the district is adjusting course sequencing to improve Algebra 1 readiness. The instructional presenter explained that the district will move advanced students into Algebra 1 earlier rather than layering another year of eighth-grade material; the change was presented as a simplification intended to match course content to readiness and to rely on data-driven regrouping for intervention rather than creating multi-year tracked streams.

Several procurement and partnership items were placed on the upcoming March 17 agenda: a multi-year renewal for the district's secondary social-studies digital curriculum (referred to as Techbook/Discovery-like product), a six-year renewal of the high-school English platform StudySync (presented cost: $545,000 for the term), a purchase of StudySync curricular resources for high-school courses, a memorandum of understanding for an education dual-credit pathway with East Stroudsburg University (for students in the district's education pathway), and a K-12 language-development purchase (Flashlight 360) used in an ESOL pilot to benchmark speaking and writing skills. Staff said the tech-product renewals had been vetted by instructional teams and coaches prior to the committee meeting.

Staff and curriculum leaders spent time on pedagogy and literacy concerns: the literacy coach and curriculum leaders described districtwide training in evidence-based content-area literacy strategies and said novels and longer texts remain part of the secondary program. Staff acknowledged concerns from faculty and the public about students' stamina for long-form reading and said StudySync units are customizable and that novels continue to be used as companion or full-length texts.

Committee members asked about student and faculty input into the program-of-studies work and were told student advisory groups and faculty teams inform the ongoing development. The committee did not take formal votes on the curriculum items at the meeting; staff said the listed purchases and the East Stroudsburg MOU will appear as action items on the March 17 board agenda.