Anonymous wrote:This is ridiculous. Teachers walk into my kids school at 8:45 and walk out 5 minutes after the kids at 3:35. That’s less than 7 hours. Can’t they stay and extra hour or two after school for planning?

Half random Mondays were a complete waste a
Of time at our school. 1/3 of the parents just keep their kids home. The ones that go to school are there for 3.5hrs. They don’t even learn on these days. Zero. They have two 25 minute recess and a 25minute lunch around 10:45 am and a snack at 9:45. Then school family and iPads. It’s insane you call this a school day.

Our first bell when kids enter the building is 8:30 and the end of day bell is at 3:30. That’s 7 hours right there and teachers aren’t arriving after 8:30 or leaving before 3:30.

Anonymous wrote:This is ridiculous. Teachers walk into my kids school at 8:45 and walk out 5 minutes after the kids at 3:35. That’s less than 7 hours. Can’t they stay and extra hour or two after school for planning?

Half random Mondays were a complete waste a
Of time at our school. 1/3 of the parents just keep their kids home. The ones that go to school are there for 3.5hrs. They don’t even learn on these days. Zero. They have two 25 minute recess and a 25minute lunch around 10:45 am and a snack at 9:45. Then school family and iPads. It’s insane you call this a school day.

Teacher here. I leave my building when I am allowed to by contract so I can pick up my own children.

Many teachers are parents, as well.

I always work additional hours at home, making an average work day 10-11 hours long. I worked one 13 hour day this week.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Saw write up that Reid said at school board (so is it a done deal?) that ES will move the 1/2 day Monday’s to 1/2 days on Wednesday next year? I thought that 7 Mondays this year were exception for the new benchmark training that other Va school districts did over 3 days and didn’t take away from in-class student time? If was for that training, what is justification to continue and let alone, move to middle of week? Or do I have bad information and Reid did not say this?

The half day Mondays were NEVER related to Benchmark training.

Here you go, from a September email, emphasis added:

Limited Early Release Mondays for Elementary Schools: Steering Committee Update
As a reminder, FCPS elementary schools will have limited early release Mondays during the upcoming school year. The goal is to provide elementary teachers additional time to meet new professional development requirements for the Virginia Literacy Act.

This is ridiculous. Teachers walk into my kids school at 8:45 and walk out 5 minutes after the kids at 3:35. That’s less than 7 hours. Can’t they stay and extra hour or two after school for planning?

Half random Mondays were a complete waste a
Of time at our school. 1/3 of the parents just keep their kids home. The ones that go to school are there for 3.5hrs. They don’t even learn on these days. Zero. They have two 25 minute recess and a 25minute lunch around 10:45 am and a snack at 9:45. Then school family and iPads. It’s insane you call this a school day.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do high schools get this too? Those teachers also need planning time.

THEY LITERALLY HAVE PLANNING TIME ALREADY

It always gets eaten up by meetings

The CBA says that secondary planning time will be implemented according to policy 4422. Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to guarantee unencumbered time.

SECONDARY TEACHER INSTRUCTIONAL PERIOD ASSIGNMENTS
The normal teaching assignment for middle, secondary, and high school teachers is five periods per day plus one planning period and one period of instructional and professional
responsibility (IPR). In schools without block scheduling, the usual teaching assignment is five periods with a planning period and an IPR period. In schools with block scheduling,
the normal teaching assignment may be five periods with a planning period and an IPR period or three two-period or class blocks with a planning period. Teachers may have other configurations for teaching assignments provided that unencumbered planning time is maintained. Teachers whose block-scheduling program alternates from day to day may have planning time on alternate days. Teaching assignments of fewer than five periods
require approval of the region assistant superintendent. Teachers assigned to teach six periods with no planning time included in their schedules would be provided extra
compensation, either through issuing longer-day contracts or through increasing the number of days of the contracts. Cooperative education coordinators may receive an
increased number of contract days and classroom assignments commensurate with the number of cooperative education students enrolled in the program.

Anonymous wrote:Saw write up that Reid said at school board (so is it a done deal?) that ES will move the 1/2 day Monday’s to 1/2 days on Wednesday next year? I thought that 7 Mondays this year were exception for the new benchmark training that other Va school districts did over 3 days and didn’t take away from in-class student time? If was for that training, what is justification to continue and let alone, move to middle of week? Or do I have bad information and Reid did not say this?

The half day Mondays were NEVER related to Benchmark training.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do high schools get this too? Those teachers also need planning time.

THEY LITERALLY HAVE PLANNING TIME ALREADY

It always gets eaten up by meetings

Quite true. It’s also nowhere near enough, which is why many of us spend 10-12 hours each weekend catching up on stuff we couldn’t get done during our busy work week.

But the PP above you apparently thinks we have all the planning time we need.

Anonymous wrote:This needs to get widespread coverage. No one knows about this. The average FCPS parent doesn’t have bandwidth to follow every minute of school board meetings and everyone I am telling about this doesn’t even believe it because it sounds so ridiculous.

I actually follow them closely and watched most of the meeting last night and I missed this! It didn’t even come up in a discussion of the calendar. Very, very shady.

Anonymous wrote:The half days were for the literacy act trainings. Other districts added full teacher workdays or paid for summer training.

These Mondays were heavily structured and only ended up with half an hour of extra planning time per Monday for our teachers. They were assigned more training and meetings for these hours at the local level too.

Teacher planning and learning time is important but these early release days were not worth it!

This is clearly school dependent. We had the 3 hours each time.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do high schools get this too? Those teachers also need planning time.

THEY LITERALLY HAVE PLANNING TIME ALREADY

It always gets eaten up by meetings

I believe the curriculum is released for next year is for K-8. Will middle schools also be having the early Wednesday dismissal? A half-day in middle school means the students are released at 11:15 a.m.

Anonymous wrote:Do high schools get this too? Those teachers also need planning time.

THEY LITERALLY HAVE PLANNING TIME ALREADY

Do high schools get this too? Those teachers also need planning time.

Parents have to go back into the office 5 days a week so there should be no school days off at all.

The teachers are not getting the promised raise. This should be done every week.