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

[Anonymous]

How to do a school calendar. By MCPS

First put the Jews against the Christians against the Muslims to duke it out for 2 days off.

Then put the teachers and public teachers union against the taxpayers for 2-3 days off to have catered sessions with no students around on a weekday.

Then, get the state to grant all Gov't paid holidays so private sector parents have to take off or pay for childcare those days and pretend those days are untouchable by any process.

Finally, call the press and gin up the crazies in chat rooms to puppeteer the local and state elections in favor of liberal elites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Can you please show me that an extra week, or even two, of summer vacation causes a substantially greater loss?

So far, no one has.

Seems like that would have been a great thing to study BEFORE issuing the Ocean City edict.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Now this is a political thread too?

This was always a political thread. This has nothing to do with educating the kids. There are easy fixes to this "problem" but, watch, MCPS will take Spring Break away from the kids and say "Look what that evil Republican Larry Hogan did to you".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now this is a political thread too?

This was always a political thread. This has nothing to do with educating the kids. There are easy fixes to this "problem" but, watch, MCPS will take Spring Break away from the kids and say "Look what that evil Republican Larry Hogan did to you".

Such as?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now this is a political thread too?

This was always a political thread. This has nothing to do with educating the kids. There are easy fixes to this "problem" but, watch, MCPS will take Spring Break away from the kids and say "Look what that evil Republican Larry Hogan did to you".

Such as?

Put the kids in school all day, 5 days per week!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now this is a political thread too?

This was always a political thread. This has nothing to do with educating the kids. There are easy fixes to this "problem" but, watch, MCPS will take Spring Break away from the kids and say "Look what that evil Republican Larry Hogan did to you".

Such as?

Put the kids in school all day, 5 days per week!

Even on days when state law requires schools to be closed? Even on days when there are more teacher absences than subs to fill them? It's not just Montgomery County having troubles fitting their calendar into Hogan's straitjacket. That suggests to me that there are not, in fact, any easy fixes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Jewish holidays should be the first to go. If it means that much then pull your kids.
Next should be winter break - only need to have Christmas and New Years off. If you want more days pull your kids
Might as well do away with President's Day as well, soon enough that day will go the way of Columbus Day.

Then you need to change state law, which requires schools to close between December 24 and January 1.

Love how the teachers union lobbied for that.

And here we are. Teachers union paid federal and national and professional holidays versus religious holidays.

Are you an idiot? Those days off are not paid. Teachers get paid based on the number of "working days," whether nonworking days intercede.

Now I'm confused. [b]what days off during non-summer months are not paid for teachers? I assumed all days off during the school year are paid[i]. I also agree with the various PP's this has deliberately gotten political and parties are trying to make trouble with religious groups to fight Hogan over the school calendar puzzle. Yet professional days and Columbus/Martin Luther/President's days are not on the table.

You assumed incorrectly. Teachers are paid for 195 work days. This year there are 182 instructional days which is why preservice week was extended to 8 days. There are two professional days this year--January 26th and June 13th. Then for the additional 3 days of payment teachers have to document 24 hours of time spent working outside the duty day, but the documented work has to be related to the School Improvement Plan. One of those 3 days can be used for planning within the school day (either two half days or one full day) but teachers must get a sub and write sub plans. That brings them to 195 paid days. No holidays or other days off are paid.

I love how on this board when someone refutes commonly held assumptions with actual facts that there are crickets. I guess it just doesn't fit peoples' strongly held assumptions that teachers have many paid days off and that they're just greedy/lazy and sit around eating catered lunches during professional days. Interesting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

+1

[Anonymous]

Why should teachers have an issue? They had a whole lot of non-instructional days in which they were fed and had team building exercises. They were still paid!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And instead of coming up with a rational solution to their "problem", MCPS will instead use it as an opportunity to punish students hoping they can get parents angry enough to vote out the republican governor. The kids are just pawns in the world of politics, power, and money.

Exactly. It is political posturing by liberal Montgomery County leadership to try to turn public opinion against Governor Hogan as he heads toward reelection. It's a wasted and pointless effort since Montgomery County isn't likely to go his way anyway. Fortunately most of the rest of the population of Maryland is more sensible, and Governor Hogan will be able to continue doing all the great things he has been doing for the great state of Maryland for four more years. You all aren't really so naive as to think this has anything to do with education, do you?

Agreed. I respect Gov. Hogan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Jewish holidays should be the first to go. If it means that much then pull your kids.
Next should be winter break - only need to have Christmas and New Years off. If you want more days pull your kids
Might as well do away with President's Day as well, soon enough that day will go the way of Columbus Day.

Then you need to change state law, which requires schools to close between December 24 and January 1.

Love how the teachers union lobbied for that.

And here we are. Teachers union paid federal and national and professional holidays versus religious holidays.

Are you an idiot? Those days off are not paid. Teachers get paid based on the number of "working days," whether nonworking days intercede.

Now I'm confused. [b]what days off during non-summer months are not paid for teachers? I assumed all days off during the school year are paid[i]. I also agree with the various PP's this has deliberately gotten political and parties are trying to make trouble with religious groups to fight Hogan over the school calendar puzzle. Yet professional days and Columbus/Martin Luther/President's days are not on the table.

You assumed incorrectly. Teachers are paid for 195 work days. This year there are 182 instructional days which is why preservice week was extended to 8 days. There are two professional days this year--January 26th and June 13th. Then for the additional 3 days of payment teachers have to document 24 hours of time spent working outside the duty day, but the documented work has to be related to the School Improvement Plan. One of those 3 days can be used for planning within the school day (either two half days or one full day) but teachers must get a sub and write sub plans. That brings them to 195 paid days. No holidays or other days off are paid.

I love how on this board when someone refutes commonly held assumptions with actual facts that there are crickets. I guess it just doesn't fit peoples' strongly held assumptions that teachers have many paid days off and that they're just greedy/lazy and sit around eating catered lunches during professional days. Interesting.

Do you need a sticker for all your lengthy posts about your teacher union terms?
I expect any employee anywhere to get their job done and get it done well, and if it needs after hours or weekend work, so be it. No way does that imply I am taking a vacation day during the school week because a teacher refuses to "plan" outside of his/her teacher union edict hours and dates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now this is a political thread too?

This was always a political thread. This has nothing to do with educating the kids. There are easy fixes to this "problem" but, watch, MCPS will take Spring Break away from the kids and say "Look what that evil Republican Larry Hogan did to you".

Such as?

Put the kids in school all day, 5 days per week!

Even on days when state law requires schools to be closed? Even on days when there are more teacher absences than subs to fill them? It's not just Montgomery County having troubles fitting their calendar into Hogan's straitjacket. That suggests to me that there are not, in fact, any easy fixes.

Yes and please provide 2017 numbers of all the religious Jewish teachers and subs who plan to No Show on all Jewish holidays. Also provide the # and % Christian, Muslim, chinese, SE Asian and other.
What is it 1-5% of total teachers? Do not include the bloated admin count.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Add 15 minutes to each school day. That's 45 additional hours of school per year (equivalent to about 6 additional days of school). <drops mic.... walk away....>

This thread feels like 22 pages of arguments on whose holidays should be represented. But, if the real question is how do we not lose the 184 days worth of learning then this idea makes some sense. Add 2 minutes to each class period and 1 minute to lunch. It's good to hear a solution brought forward instead of just a bunch of endless complaining.

+1

Would never happen, though. The buses! The after-school programs! They'd come up with some reason it wouldn't work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Jewish holidays should be the first to go. If it means that much then pull your kids.
Next should be winter break - only need to have Christmas and New Years off. If you want more days pull your kids
Might as well do away with President's Day as well, soon enough that day will go the way of Columbus Day.

Then you need to change state law, which requires schools to close between December 24 and January 1.

Love how the teachers union lobbied for that.

And here we are. Teachers union paid federal and national and professional holidays versus religious holidays.

Are you an idiot? Those days off are not paid. Teachers get paid based on the number of "working days," whether nonworking days intercede.

Now I'm confused. [b]what days off during non-summer months are not paid for teachers? I assumed all days off during the school year are paid[i]. I also agree with the various PP's this has deliberately gotten political and parties are trying to make trouble with religious groups to fight Hogan over the school calendar puzzle. Yet professional days and Columbus/Martin Luther/President's days are not on the table.

You assumed incorrectly. Teachers are paid for 195 work days. This year there are 182 instructional days which is why preservice week was extended to 8 days. There are two professional days this year--January 26th and June 13th. Then for the additional 3 days of payment teachers have to document 24 hours of time spent working outside the duty day, but the documented work has to be related to the School Improvement Plan. One of those 3 days can be used for planning within the school day (either two half days or one full day) but teachers must get a sub and write sub plans. That brings them to 195 paid days. No holidays or other days off are paid.

I love how on this board when someone refutes commonly held assumptions with actual facts that there are crickets. I guess it just doesn't fit peoples' strongly held assumptions that teachers have many paid days off and that they're just greedy/lazy and sit around eating catered lunches during professional days. Interesting.

It's because you are so full of it that nobody wants to get near your posts. Anyone can go out and read your contract. http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/uploadedFiles/departments/associationrelations/refresh2014/MCEA%20Contract%20FY15-FY17%20.pdf. Here's one highlight:


.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Can you please show me that an extra week, or even two, of summer vacation causes a substantially greater loss?

So far, no one has.

Seems like that would have been a great thing to study BEFORE issuing the Ocean City edict.

Why? Why is there any reason to think 11 weeks would cause harm when 10 weeks is acceptable?