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

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

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]

Teachers have the week between Christmas and New Years and the week of Spring break to have professional in service days in addition to summer.  There are 261 non-weekend days in a year.   Most of us get 10 federal holidays a year and do not get a week off at Christmas and a week off in March.  Accounting for the 9 federal holidays (July 4 is not in teh school year), that leaves 252 weekdays a year.  Take off 180 days for school and there are still 71 week days.  The teachers can have their professional days on those 71 week days.  That's typically 5 days at Christmas, 5 days for Spring break and 61 days spread across the summer.  They need to handle their in-service days on those days.  And if the issue is the pay, then the union needs to negotiate an appropriate payment level to compensate the teachers.  However, that is a discussion outside the scheduling of the school year.   There are 185 days between 4 Sep 2018 and 14 Jun 2019 that are not any of the federal holidays, the week between Christmas and New Year and one week for spring break.  There should not be a problem fitting in 180 days of school.  There's even some leeway if you need snow days (up to 5).  [/quote]

False, according to the following MCPS e-mail snippet:

[quote]
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)

[b]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.[/b]
[/quote]

QED. You have been defeated.[/quote]

I beg to differ.  Here's the 2018-2019 calendar with notes

[code]MONTH  SCH.DAYS	TOTAL	NOTES
Sep	     19      	       19              Start 9/4
Oct        22	       41              Off 10/8 Columbus Day
Nov       20	       61              Off 11/22-23 Thanksgiving
Dec       15	       76              Winter break 12/24-1/1
Jan        21	       97              Start 1/2, off MLK day 1/21
Feb        19	     116             Off 2/18, President's Day
Ma         16	     132             5 days off for Spring break
Apr        20             152              2 Days off for Easter (Good Friday, Easter Monday)
May       22             174              Off 5/27 for Memorial Day
Jun        10             184              School ends 6/14[/code]

This includes 15 days off (Columbus Day, 2 Thanksgiving days, 7 days for Christmas/New Years, MLK day, President's day, 2 days for Easter, Memorial Day).

There are 184 possible days of instruction including 4 days at the end of the school year to handle snow days without compromising holidays.

What the school district doesn't want to do it give up teacher paid days without students.  However, while you need to have a winter break and spring break for students, employees aren't required to get those breaks.  Take a teacher in-service day the week between Christmas and New Years and another one during the Spring break week.  They can take one or more days the week before  school opens. [/quote]

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