How to fit school days into Gov Larry Hogan's ridiculous policy on school start and stop dates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We aren't in DC, but in Chesterfield, Va. The kids have 180 total days. That fit in those start & stop with a week-long spring break, 2 weeks at Christmas, not sure how many state holidays.

http://mychesterfieldschools.com/wp-content/uploads/calendar_files/CCPS2017-18_calendar.pdf

That calendar would not be legit under the Maryland governor's order.

That was my post. Are there more state holidays? 15 sounds like a lot. Do they have 1/2 days, our calendar counts those as a full instructional day (biggest waste of time).

[Anonymous]

I have just commented on their site. I will be contacting appropriate representatives about reducing contact days to less than 180. I find 180 days too much, given how many schools, public and private learn more or just as much with less days. I am very happy with after the Labor Day start, but strongly opposed to less than a week of Spring Break. I will have my kid stay at home, if that is what it takes. I am also for shorter school days, you realize that MD has an average school day of 7 hours, well, 1 minute less. Longer than many US states? Why? My DD is having no teacher for 2 weeks in one of her classes, but she has "contact days?" We don't need 180 days of school. I wish I made my DD attend the private school like I wanted, but she was so stuck on our assigned public school since they have a great team for her sport.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have just commented on their site. I will be contacting appropriate representatives about reducing contact days to less than 180. I find 180 days too much, given how many schools, public and private learn more or just as much with less days. I am very happy with after the Labor Day start, but strongly opposed to less than a week of Spring Break. I will have my kid stay at home, if that is what it takes. I am also for shorter school days, you realize that MD has an average school day of 7 hours, well, 1 minute less. Longer than many US states? Why? My DD is having no teacher for 2 weeks in one of her classes, but she has "contact days?" We don't need 180 days of school. I wish I made my DD attend the private school like I wanted, but she was so stuck on our assigned public school since they have a great team for her sport.

It is apparent from your post that you place a high value on education, and have passed that onto your daughter. Congratulations, or something.

[Anonymous]

Put all teacher professional days outside of the curriculum teaching days from 9/4/18 to 6/14/19:

MONTH SCH.DAYS TOTAL NOTES Sep 19 19 Start 9/4 Oct 22 41 Off 10/8 Columbus Day Nov 19 60 Off 11/12 Veterans' Day, Off 11/22-23 Thanksgiving Dec 15 75 Winter break 12/24-1/1 Jan 21 96 Start 1/2, off MLK day 1/21 Feb 19 115 Off 2/18, President's Day Ma 16 131 5 days off for Spring break Apr 22 153 May 22 175 Off 5/27 for Memorial Day Jun 10 185 School ends 6/14

You still get a week off for the winter holidays and a week off for Spring break.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Easy solution: move the teacher "admin days" from during the school year to the summer.

The reason the union opposes it is that it cuts into the teachers' (paid) summer vacation.

Teachers don't get paid for summer vacation. Or winter break, spring break or other days when school is closed. Moving professional days to the summer only hurts students because without them teachers don't have a chunk of time to input grades, plan for the upcoming marking period, collaborate with colleagues without it being scripted and for the benefit of admin, deep clean their classroom, file away materials and paperwork from the previous marking period, change bulletin boards, and other such things that can't be done with kids in the classroom. A lot of those things can't be done if all professional days were to be moved to the summer. From what I hear, the 3 extra days this past summer were filled with useless, time consuming mandated trainings from the county.
-spouse of a teacher

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MCPS parents just got the email pasted below. I certainly hope we don't lose any of the 184 days of learning the kids are entitled to just because the governor wants our children to spend more money in Ocean City forgetting all the math and reading they've learned over the year because we "love summer" so much. Cutting spring break is not the answer either. Didn't anyone tell him that research shows that shorter breaks, not a long summer vacation, reduces the chances of kids backtracking in their learning? Smh.

Dear MCPS Community,

It’s that time of year again when we develop the school calendar for the following school year. Since last year, school districts across Maryland have been discussing how best to design their school calendars given the new time constraints placed on the length of the school year. The current 2017–2018 school year is the first school year operating under these new rules, which are that school cannot start before Labor Day and must end before June 15.

We have been meeting with focus groups of parents, staff, and other stakeholder groups these past several weeks, and we welcome your feedback on how best to design the 2018-2019 school calendar. Next year, we will have even fewer days to work with than in years past to accommodate our instructional traditions, such as having 184 instructional days, and our non-instructional traditions, such as a full week for Spring Break. As we design next year’s calendar, we start with several requirements from the State:

September 4–June 14: the permissible time frame for instruction
180: the minimum number of instructional days required
15: the number of State mandated days that schools must be closed
3: the number of snow make-up days required at the end of the year (before June 14)


Once the calendar accounts for these State required elements, a total of six days remain that can be programmed for other, non-required educational or operational priorities, such as Spring Break or instructional days above the state minimum of 180. How to allocate these days among our multiple calendar priorities is our challenge.

For a more detailed explanation of the calendar, as well as to see various examples of how the calendar could be developed, please visit our school calendar webpage. If you would like to offer comment on the calendar, please do so using the drop box provided on the calendar webpage.

Thank you for your continued support.

Montgomery County Public Schools

Take a deep breath.

There is more than enough time to get the required 180 days of classroom instruction.

I am married to an MCPS teacher and she and many of her colleagues have absolutely no issue with Hogan's action, despite their union telling them to be so upset about it.

So your wife doesn't care about the boatload of research that indicated that longer breaks adversely impact retention? Fantastic.

Let me guess, though - they all have strong opinions about the calendar options that take away the two non-instructional days the first three weeks of school.

Do you have kids in school? We have two in MCPS for total of 17 academic years. The kids aint doing any learning the last 7 days. Its just movies, videos and field days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have just commented on their site. I will be contacting appropriate representatives about reducing contact days to less than 180. I find 180 days too much, given how many schools, public and private learn more or just as much with less days. I am very happy with after the Labor Day start, but strongly opposed to less than a week of Spring Break. I will have my kid stay at home, if that is what it takes. I am also for shorter school days, you realize that MD has an average school day of 7 hours, well, 1 minute less. Longer than many US states? Why? My DD is having no teacher for 2 weeks in one of her classes, but she has "contact days?" We don't need 180 days of school. I wish I made my DD attend the private school like I wanted, but she was so stuck on our assigned public school since they have a great team for her sport.

It is apparent from your post that you place a high value on education, and have passed that onto your daughter. Congratulations, or something.

You confuse contact days with actual education? Wow. Yes, she plays sports too. Let me explain this, so less educated people can understand, contact days do not equal actual learning and good instruction. Not only does my DD have tutoring, sports and foreign language instruction, she is fluent in three languages and taking medical classes, AP classes, prep classes. You think any high achieving student in MCPS relies only on school instruction to learn? Or private school student as well, for that matter? Maybe in Japan or South Korea. People who value education do not sit back and let school lead, as long as they have resources, they provide additional instruction to their kids. Your kid will learn what from 3,4 extra days of school? Do tell!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Put all teacher professional days outside of the curriculum teaching days from 9/4/18 to 6/14/19:


You still get a week off for the winter holidays and a week off for Spring break.

Why would that be a good thing to do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You confuse contact days with actual education? Wow. Yes, she plays sports too. Let me explain this, so less educated people can understand, contact days do not equal actual learning and good instruction. Not only does my DD have tutoring, sports and foreign language instruction, she is fluent in three languages and taking medical classes, AP classes, prep classes. You think any high achieving student in MCPS relies only on school instruction to learn? Or private school student as well, for that matter? Maybe in Japan or South Korea. People who value education do not sit back and let school lead, as long as they have resources, they provide additional instruction to their kids. Your kid will learn what from 3,4 extra days of school? Do tell!

Indeed, why have any school at all?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have just commented on their site. I will be contacting appropriate representatives about reducing contact days to less than 180. I find 180 days too much, given how many schools, public and private learn more or just as much with less days. I am very happy with after the Labor Day start, but strongly opposed to less than a week of Spring Break. I will have my kid stay at home, if that is what it takes. I am also for shorter school days, you realize that MD has an average school day of 7 hours, well, 1 minute less. Longer than many US states? Why? My DD is having no teacher for 2 weeks in one of her classes, but she has "contact days?" We don't need 180 days of school. I wish I made my DD attend the private school like I wanted, but she was so stuck on our assigned public school since they have a great team for her sport.

It is apparent from your post that you place a high value on education, and have passed that onto your daughter. Congratulations, or something.

You confuse contact days with actual education? Wow. Yes, she plays sports too. Let me explain this, so less educated people can understand, contact days do not equal actual learning and good instruction. Not only does my DD have tutoring, sports and foreign language instruction, she is fluent in three languages and taking medical classes, AP classes, prep classes. You think any high achieving student in MCPS relies only on school instruction to learn? Or private school student as well, for that matter? Maybe in Japan or South Korea. People who value education do not sit back and let school lead, as long as they have resources, they provide additional instruction to their kids. Your kid will learn what from 3,4 extra days of school? Do tell!

If MCPS wants any federal money, it needs to have 180 days of school. That is not the issue.

The issue is how to get to 180.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Easy solution: move the teacher "admin days" from during the school year to the summer.

The reason the union opposes it is that it cuts into the teachers' (paid) summer vacation.

Why is it good for all professional training to happen before the school year starts or after the school year ends?

What's wrong with that? I"m in private industry, and just about all our professional conferences are in the summer since people are too busy the rest of the year. Just about all industries seem to work fine with people being trained once a year, so surely teachers can handle it also.

As for having time to input grades and so on, indeed teachers may have to work more than an 8-hour day on those days... just like we do in private industry during busy times of year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry but its not ridiculous. We grew up in the midwest with harsh winters thus the occasional snow day and school started after labor day. The fix us the teachers and administrators dont need so many admin days.

I agree. The only thing that is ridiculous is that the BOE will never stop whining to the state and cry to public about "oh no, what should we do?" about every little thing. Just DO YOUR JOBS and get a calendar in place for next year. I honestly don't give a crap what days are off or not so long as we keep the summer long and the constant 3-4 day school weeks to a minimum. If I need to celebrate a holiday or take a vacation, my kids won't be in school those days. They have survived before and will survive next year too. And yes, I have a high schooler. It doesn't matter. Just make the f'ing calendar already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Easy solution: move the teacher "admin days" from during the school year to the summer.

The reason the union opposes it is that it cuts into the teachers' (paid) summer vacation.

Why is it good for all professional training to happen before the school year starts or after the school year ends?

What's wrong with that? I"m in private industry, and just about all our professional conferences are in the summer since people are too busy the rest of the year. Just about all industries seem to work fine with people being trained once a year, so surely teachers can handle it also.

As for having time to input grades and so on, indeed teachers may have to work more than an 8-hour day on those days... just like we do in private industry during busy times of year.

It was no issue for either teachers or parents untill Hogan's policy. Let's keep that in mind.

[Anonymous]

Why is this a ridiculous policy? I do 't get it.

Personally we love the longer summer. If you don't like it, then put your kid in an academic camp or something. It's nice to have that long break.

We always started after Labor Day when I was growing up in NY.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry but its not ridiculous. We grew up in the midwest with harsh winters thus the occasional snow day and school started after labor day. The fix us the teachers and administrators dont need so many admin days.

I agree. The only thing that is ridiculous is that the BOE will never stop whining to the state and cry to public about "oh no, what should we do?" about every little thing. Just DO YOUR JOBS and get a calendar in place for next year. I honestly don't give a crap what days are off or not so long as we keep the summer long and the constant 3-4 day school weeks to a minimum. If I need to celebrate a holiday or take a vacation, my kids won't be in school those days. They have survived before and will survive next year too. And yes, I have a high schooler. It doesn't matter. Just make the f'ing calendar already.

This. I don't understand what the issue is here. I don't remember ever getting an email like this before bout planning the school calendar. Even those years when/after we used up the snow days. Why does this justify an email to every parent but the sexual predator incident at Richard Montgomery HS was not addressed by email??

Just set the calendar and move the f along.