MCPS closed for Diwali?
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Anonymous
| I was surprised. Is the Indian or Hindu population that large in MoCo? Where in the county do Diwali celebrants live? |
Anonymous
| They probably live everywhere in the county. |
Anonymous
| It might be large. Look at the school attendance. |
Anonymous
| It’s the end of the quarter. |
Anonymous
| Yes, they schedule professional days to accommodate religious holidays. |
Anonymous
They might have shifted it slightly but they always take a break for grading at the end of each quarter and that doesn’t shift much. |
Anonymous
| The end of the marking period is November 4th. Today is a professional day for teachers. We’ll be in meetings all day at my school. |
Anonymous
Clarksburg. Check out the At A Glance report for the Clarksburg Elementary Schools. For example, Clarksburg ES's largest student population is Asian at 37%. I live in the area and I can confirm that majority of that 37% are Indian students. |
Anonymous
| I have online trainings and grading with my teacher co-horts. Most staff at my school can do this at home and will do so |
Anonymous
| So today is a professional day for teachers, then, and schools are not closed for Diwali? It's just a coincidence? |
Anonymous
Same. I’ve been up since 6:30 grading because my body is trained to be up early and my mental energy slumps in the afternoon. I’m grateful I can do the PD Day from home. My trainings begin at 9 AM today. I get to skip the 8 AM one because I teach a singleton. The new teachers have to report this morning for training from 8 AM until 11:30. Then they have a 30 min lunch break. Next, they can plan or grade in their rooms. No telecommuting for them. |
Anonymous
They intentionally schedule some professional days for teachers on days which are also holidays, when they're able to. Same thing with Lunar New Year and Eid. |
Anonymous
I don’t think it is a coincidence. But I don’t have an issue with it. About 10% of my students celebrate Diwali. If we had school today, it would be difficult to do anything of substance because I would need to create a way for them to make it up. |
Anonymous
| I’m a little bummed the teachers have no many meetings and trainings. Some of my HS kid’s teachers are significantly behind on grading and we had hoped they would get caught up today. It’s really a problem for kids when they have no idea how they are doing in a class—makes it much harder to learn what they are doing wrong and correct, which is really the whole point of school. |
Anonymous
And that's why there is no school for students on Monday, November 7th. |