MCPS updated calendar is insane

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There was absolutely no teacher feedback requested for these changes in the calendar. No teachers want to go into June 25th.
Teachers work summer school, have other jobs etc. Keeping all of the school buildings open this late in the summer as well as providing buses and meals for students through that week will large added expenses for a school system that already claims to not have enough money.

Then you guys need to work with your union to have MCPS do better upfront planning and push them to use early contingency days. MCPS will say they can't because of the union. If that's not correct, or if the union isn't representing the best interest of the teachers, then you all need to speak up.

Ahh the typical Anti-Union moron is here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's 2018-2019: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://teacherquality.nctq.org/dmsView/0285_18_2018-19_SchoolCalendar&ved=2ahUKEwjQ7LaSmeiSAxVXFlkFHR48GuQQFnoECBAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2Bv9-dJpYrnJ4juwux-MaD

Looks like they used to have half days for end of quarter grading/planning instead of full.

They need to go back to that.

Yes, we can't have BOTH full-day grading days and take off every single religious holiday. I don't care which we get rid of, but it has to be one.

Or you start one week earlier in August like FCPS dose, and which also has a lot of religious holidays built in (and 3 snow days, unlike stupid MCPS which only puts in 1). There are a lot of options here that are preferrable to this annual chaos around MCPS snow days.

Where I grew up we had 3 snow days. If they weren't used, school ended earlier. If there were more than 3 snow days, they were added on in June. There wasn't this drama and constantly shifting calendars like MCPS does.

I hate MCPS but FCPS goes by hours so they have a lot of flexibility in their schedule. They added 30min to every day about 10 years ago and didn't have to make up a week of snow days

Going by hours makes so much sense. Why don’t we do that?

Because the rest of the country does 180 days in school and because half the kids in MCPS can't read or do math at grade level. But if we're following FCPS as an example, can we start 1 week earlier in August than MCPS currently does like they do? FCPS has several snow days built into their calendar.

Actually only a few states ACTUALLY require 180 separate calendar days. Maryland is one so is New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Others allow a specific amount of hours to count as equivalent of 180 days.

NJ, CT and MA have among the highest performing states in education. I would rather my kids have 180 days like their residents than this hours BS. Also, NJ, CT and MA all have snow but seem to manage doing 180 days without all the chaos of MCPS.

NY too-- grew up in a far snowier area with amazing schools in NY-- school starts after labor day and ends late June but two full vacation weeks (feb and april), no silly easter monday

NY says 180 days however they are allowed up to 4 PD days (called Superintendent Conference days) to counts towards the 180 day requirement. MD (along with NJ, CT, MA) don't have that luxury.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grading and planning days are essential. You can get rid of them if you want but it will be to the detriment of students. Having the day off means we can carefully go through grades and make sure there are no mistakes. It also gives us a few hours to grade stuff. Finally it gives teachers time to reflect and do some planning for future lessons. Take it away and many of us will just hastily throw something together for planning purposes. Think of some of your kids teachers who you like and who do a good job. Good teaching doesn’t just happen. It takes a lot of planning and effort. And trying new things.

In HS there are 8 periods. Teachers have classes for 5-6 periods at most. The school day is exactly 7.5hrs.

Most salary employees work 9-10hrs a day. Many catch up at night too.

I think teachers do not get paid well enough and I would argue for more half days for grading. But full days off are not productive in my opinion. You just had 4 days off. There will be a long Spring Break in late March/early April. Being against April 15th is absolutely ridiculous. Could have made it half day easily.

When the teachers and MCPS are not flexible, why should the state be?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the most ridiculous MCPS school calendars ever. Every single one of these clowns need to be voted out.

Essentially, you have starting on the 18th School
No school
Weekend
School
No school
School- half day
School- half day

Nobody’s going to be there after the 18th. Flat out ridiculous and a waste of resources.

This is stupid and bad planning by McPS, particularly since we had this same issue last year. But I sent both my kids to school last year on the half days and they said about 2/3 of the kids were there and they did fun activities with the teacher.

But my kids aren’t in a rich school where everyone goes to sleepaway camp.

Last year's makeup days were June 16 and 17 still ending before Juneteenth and the 1st official day of summer. June 25 goes beyond both of those and there is even a cherry on top with the election day on June 23. Just hold school (full, 3/4, or half days) on March 20 and April 15 and end June 22. While being open for one day after a 3-day weekend is awful it at least curtails the problem to one day and ends before that election day.

I agree. But MCPS in its infinite wisdom doesn't want to use the makeup days it submitted for approval to the BOE and no one is holding them accountable. I truly don't understand why make-up days exist on the MCPS calendar if they're not to make up school.

The state is making them accountable by denying the waiver. And now millions wasted keeping the doors open for another week and the loss of using the facilities for camps for a week. MCPS is embarrassing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So why does MCPS include makeup days in the calendar, and then not use them? 3/20 and 4/15 would have been preferable to these June days.

They are trying to get a waiver of the 180 days requirement. It’s a gambit. It appears so outrageous, and then they just want out of the days requirement. The state legislature may actually do it…even though they are not using the designated back up days.

It was already denied yesterday. The state has had it with MCPS entitlement

MCPS is pushing emergency bill right now in state legislature to override

It didn’t work last time they tried. All other counties in Maryland but us were operational after the week off weekend AND used some of their contingency days. PG even used Presidents Day when the state allowed it. MC did not. The teachers union refused to use April 15th. Muslims want their holiday.

Why should the state allow MCPS to go less days than every other f’ing county when they haven’t put ANY effort getting these kids the right number of days.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So why does MCPS include makeup days in the calendar, and then not use them? 3/20 and 4/15 would have been preferable to these June days.

They are trying to get a waiver of the 180 days requirement. It’s a gambit. It appears so outrageous, and then they just want out of the days requirement. The state legislature may actually do it…even though they are not using the designated back up days.

It was already denied yesterday. The state has had it with MCPS entitlement

MCPS is pushing emergency bill right now in state legislature to override

It didn’t work last time they tried. All other counties in Maryland but us were operational after the week off weekend AND used some of their contingency days. PG even used Presidents Day when the state allowed it. MC did not. The teachers union refused to use April 15th. Muslims want their holiday.

Why should the state allow MCPS to go less days than every other f’ing county when they haven’t put ANY effort getting these kids the right number of days.

PG did NOT use Presidents Day despite the state allowing it. April 15th could easily be split into two half days to cover the "days" requirement, afterall the same teachers union allowed it to be designated as a makeup day! Muslims should get their holiday but Maryland law should be changed this summer so this is the LAST year we have this issue. Just don't come after June 18. If the law is changed the teachers can get their week back at the other end and return on August 24 instead of 17 and school can start August 31/September 1 instead of August 24/25.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's 2018-2019: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://teacherquality.nctq.org/dmsView/0285_18_2018-19_SchoolCalendar&ved=2ahUKEwjQ7LaSmeiSAxVXFlkFHR48GuQQFnoECBAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2Bv9-dJpYrnJ4juwux-MaD

Looks like they used to have half days for end of quarter grading/planning instead of full.

They need to go back to that.

Yes, we can't have BOTH full-day grading days and take off every single religious holiday. I don't care which we get rid of, but it has to be one.

Or you start one week earlier in August like FCPS dose, and which also has a lot of religious holidays built in (and 3 snow days, unlike stupid MCPS which only puts in 1). There are a lot of options here that are preferrable to this annual chaos around MCPS snow days.

Where I grew up we had 3 snow days. If they weren't used, school ended earlier. If there were more than 3 snow days, they were added on in June. There wasn't this drama and constantly shifting calendars like MCPS does.

I hate MCPS but FCPS goes by hours so they have a lot of flexibility in their schedule. They added 30min to every day about 10 years ago and didn't have to make up a week of snow days

Going by hours makes so much sense. Why don’t we do that?

Because the rest of the country does 180 days in school and because half the kids in MCPS can't read or do math at grade level. But if we're following FCPS as an example, can we start 1 week earlier in August than MCPS currently does like they do? FCPS has several snow days built into their calendar.

Actually only a few states ACTUALLY require 180 separate calendar days. Maryland is one so is New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Others allow a specific amount of hours to count as equivalent of 180 days.

NJ, CT and MA have among the highest performing states in education. I would rather my kids have 180 days like their residents than this hours BS. Also, NJ, CT and MA all have snow but seem to manage doing 180 days without all the chaos of MCPS.

They have later start times for HS and stricter cell phone rules but let’s conveniently ignore everything else and fixate on number of days in school. Sitting in school for extra days half asleep or on your phone helps no one

[Anonymous]

Starting a week early will solve almost all problems. I don’t get why it’s so hard to do that? Fairfax county is doing it..why can’t we?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There was absolutely no teacher feedback requested for these changes in the calendar. No teachers want to go into June 25th.
Teachers work summer school, have other jobs etc. Keeping all of the school buildings open this late in the summer as well as providing buses and meals for students through that week will large added expenses for a school system that already claims to not have enough money.

Then you guys need to work with your union to have MCPS do better upfront planning and push them to use early contingency days. MCPS will say they can't because of the union. If that's not correct, or if the union isn't representing the best interest of the teachers, then you all need to speak up.

Ahh the typical Anti-Union moron is here.

I didn't read that post as being against the union - it was about making sure the union is representing its members and how that's communicated. And that is a legitimate concern. I honestly don't understand how or why the county gets away with listing make up days and not using them two years in a row now and still has those same makeup days listed in next years calendar when it clearly will only be used as a tool to apply for a waiver with no real intent to use it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grading and planning days are essential. You can get rid of them if you want but it will be to the detriment of students. Having the day off means we can carefully go through grades and make sure there are no mistakes. It also gives us a few hours to grade stuff. Finally it gives teachers time to reflect and do some planning for future lessons. Take it away and many of us will just hastily throw something together for planning purposes. Think of some of your kids teachers who you like and who do a good job. Good teaching doesn’t just happen. It takes a lot of planning and effort. And trying new things.

In HS there are 8 periods. Teachers have classes for 5-6 periods at most. The school day is exactly 7.5hrs.

Most salary employees work 9-10hrs a day. Many catch up at night too.

I think teachers do not get paid well enough and I would argue for more half days for grading. But full days off are not productive in my opinion. You just had 4 days off. There will be a long Spring Break in late March/early April. Being against April 15th is absolutely ridiculous. Could have made it half day easily.

When the teachers and MCPS are not flexible, why should the state be?

We may be at work for 7.5, but we are actively ON for 6 of those. This is not time to sit at a desk grading 170 papers or respond to 40 emails. We’re managing 30+ teenagers simultaneously, entertaining, presenting, and putting out fires. For that other 1.5 hours, we’re often called into meetings or covering other classes. So at the end of 7.5 hours, we are emotionally and physically exhausted and we haven’t even gotten a chance to start the other half of our job: planning and grading.

So I agree with the PP above who said that grading and planning time are essential. We rarely get time during our contracted work days to do it, so it’s almost all done on our off hours. And it represents half our job.

I’m not complaining. (I feel the need to write that because teacher explanations are almost always interpreted as complaints.) I’m pointing out the importance of keeping work days. They have an immeasurable impact on morale since they help us get caught up during actual work hours, and higher morale makes better teachers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There was absolutely no teacher feedback requested for these changes in the calendar. No teachers want to go into June 25th.
Teachers work summer school, have other jobs etc. Keeping all of the school buildings open this late in the summer as well as providing buses and meals for students through that week will large added expenses for a school system that already claims to not have enough money.

Then you guys need to work with your union to have MCPS do better upfront planning and push them to use early contingency days. MCPS will say they can't because of the union. If that's not correct, or if the union isn't representing the best interest of the teachers, then you all need to speak up.

Ahh the typical Anti-Union moron is here.

I didn't read that post as being against the union - it was about making sure the union is representing its members and how that's communicated. And that is a legitimate concern. I honestly don't understand how or why the county gets away with listing make up days and not using them two years in a row now and still has those same makeup days listed in next years calendar when it clearly will only be used as a tool to apply for a waiver with no real intent to use it.

+1. Parents didn’t choose this crazy June schedule. The MCPS board doc says they could not use the April 15 day that was designated and approved by the Board as a makeup day because of previous agreement with the union.

So if teachers would rather not use up their leave days to cover the new June days, they should have communicated to the union to use April 15. Then probably March 20 would have stayed too..despite the obvious targeting of Muslims.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grading and planning days are essential. You can get rid of them if you want but it will be to the detriment of students. Having the day off means we can carefully go through grades and make sure there are no mistakes. It also gives us a few hours to grade stuff. Finally it gives teachers time to reflect and do some planning for future lessons. Take it away and many of us will just hastily throw something together for planning purposes. Think of some of your kids teachers who you like and who do a good job. Good teaching doesn’t just happen. It takes a lot of planning and effort. And trying new things.

In HS there are 8 periods. Teachers have classes for 5-6 periods at most. The school day is exactly 7.5hrs.

Most salary employees work 9-10hrs a day. Many catch up at night too.

I think teachers do not get paid well enough and I would argue for more half days for grading. But full days off are not productive in my opinion. You just had 4 days off. There will be a long Spring Break in late March/early April. Being against April 15th is absolutely ridiculous. Could have made it half day easily.

When the teachers and MCPS are not flexible, why should the state be?

We may be at work for 7.5, but we are actively ON for 6 of those. This is not time to sit at a desk grading 170 papers or respond to 40 emails. We’re managing 30+ teenagers simultaneously, entertaining, presenting, and putting out fires. For that other 1.5 hours, we’re often called into meetings or covering other classes. So at the end of 7.5 hours, we are emotionally and physically exhausted and we haven’t even gotten a chance to start the other half of our job: planning and grading.

So I agree with the PP above who said that grading and planning time are essential. We rarely get time during our contracted work days to do it, so it’s almost all done on our off hours. And it represents half our job.

I’m not complaining. (I feel the need to write that because teacher explanations are almost always interpreted as complaints.) I’m pointing out the importance of keeping work days. They have an immeasurable impact on morale since they help us get caught up during actual work hours, and higher morale makes better teachers.

I'm a teacher, too. You know what's bad for morale? Going a whole extra week of school knowing there's not an extra paycheck for it.

And, yes, I know, we've already been paid for our time during the snow day, but that extra time takes away from our chance at supplemental income that many of us plan for. Or takes away from a needed break before starting ESY programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grading and planning days are essential. You can get rid of them if you want but it will be to the detriment of students. Having the day off means we can carefully go through grades and make sure there are no mistakes. It also gives us a few hours to grade stuff. Finally it gives teachers time to reflect and do some planning for future lessons. Take it away and many of us will just hastily throw something together for planning purposes. Think of some of your kids teachers who you like and who do a good job. Good teaching doesn’t just happen. It takes a lot of planning and effort. And trying new things.

In HS there are 8 periods. Teachers have classes for 5-6 periods at most. The school day is exactly 7.5hrs.

Most salary employees work 9-10hrs a day. Many catch up at night too.

I think teachers do not get paid well enough and I would argue for more half days for grading. But full days off are not productive in my opinion. You just had 4 days off. There will be a long Spring Break in late March/early April. Being against April 15th is absolutely ridiculous. Could have made it half day easily.

When the teachers and MCPS are not flexible, why should the state be?

We may be at work for 7.5, but we are actively ON for 6 of those. This is not time to sit at a desk grading 170 papers or respond to 40 emails. We’re managing 30+ teenagers simultaneously, entertaining, presenting, and putting out fires. For that other 1.5 hours, we’re often called into meetings or covering other classes. So at the end of 7.5 hours, we are emotionally and physically exhausted and we haven’t even gotten a chance to start the other half of our job: planning and grading.

So I agree with the PP above who said that grading and planning time are essential. We rarely get time during our contracted work days to do it, so it’s almost all done on our off hours. And it represents half our job.

I’m not complaining. (I feel the need to write that because teacher explanations are almost always interpreted as complaints.) I’m pointing out the importance of keeping work days. They have an immeasurable impact on morale since they help us get caught up during actual work hours, and higher morale makes better teachers.

I'm a teacher, too. You know what's bad for morale? Going a whole extra week of school knowing there's not an extra paycheck for it.

And, yes, I know, we've already been paid for our time during the snow day, but that extra time takes away from our chance at supplemental income that many of us plan for. Or takes away from a needed break before starting ESY programs.

I also hate it when I am asked to do the job I was hired to do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's 2018-2019: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://teacherquality.nctq.org/dmsView/0285_18_2018-19_SchoolCalendar&ved=2ahUKEwjQ7LaSmeiSAxVXFlkFHR48GuQQFnoECBAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2Bv9-dJpYrnJ4juwux-MaD

Looks like they used to have half days for end of quarter grading/planning instead of full.

They need to go back to that.

Yes, we can't have BOTH full-day grading days and take off every single religious holiday. I don't care which we get rid of, but it has to be one.

Or you start one week earlier in August like FCPS dose, and which also has a lot of religious holidays built in (and 3 snow days, unlike stupid MCPS which only puts in 1). There are a lot of options here that are preferrable to this annual chaos around MCPS snow days.

Where I grew up we had 3 snow days. If they weren't used, school ended earlier. If there were more than 3 snow days, they were added on in June. There wasn't this drama and constantly shifting calendars like MCPS does.

I hate MCPS but FCPS goes by hours so they have a lot of flexibility in their schedule. They added 30min to every day about 10 years ago and didn't have to make up a week of snow days

Going by hours makes so much sense. Why don’t we do that?

Because the rest of the country does 180 days in school and because half the kids in MCPS can't read or do math at grade level. But if we're following FCPS as an example, can we start 1 week earlier in August than MCPS currently does like they do? FCPS has several snow days built into their calendar.

Actually only a few states ACTUALLY require 180 separate calendar days. Maryland is one so is New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Others allow a specific amount of hours to count as equivalent of 180 days.

NJ, CT and MA have among the highest performing states in education. I would rather my kids have 180 days like their residents than this hours BS. Also, NJ, CT and MA all have snow but seem to manage doing 180 days without all the chaos of MCPS.

NY too-- grew up in a far snowier area with amazing schools in NY-- school starts after labor day and ends late June but two full vacation weeks (feb and april), no silly easter monday

NY says 180 days however they are allowed up to 4 PD days (called Superintendent Conference days) to counts towards the 180 day requirement. MD (along with NJ, CT, MA) don't have that luxury.

They could if they made PD days half days for students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Grading and planning days are essential. You can get rid of them if you want but it will be to the detriment of students. Having the day off means we can carefully go through grades and make sure there are no mistakes. It also gives us a few hours to grade stuff. Finally it gives teachers time to reflect and do some planning for future lessons. Take it away and many of us will just hastily throw something together for planning purposes. Think of some of your kids teachers who you like and who do a good job. Good teaching doesn’t just happen. It takes a lot of planning and effort. And trying new things.

In HS there are 8 periods. Teachers have classes for 5-6 periods at most. The school day is exactly 7.5hrs.

Most salary employees work 9-10hrs a day. Many catch up at night too.

Pay teachers like BigLaw partners or shut up with that nonsense .