School Board OKs Calendar Committee

debra December 9, 2011 at 04:27 am

I pray that the Board and Dr. Jinohosa find compassion for working parents and keep the more traditional calendar that is currently being used. The so-called balanced calendar forces working parents to find childcare for approximately 1 week per month. This was expensive for me, plus it can be very difficult to patchwork care during nontraditional beak weeks--in other words, it's a heck of a lot easier to find care during the breaks of summer, Christmas, and spring, then for a week here and there. Furthermore, I find the breaks more disruptive to my child's fluidity and concentration of learning time, as if teaching math to a 3rd grader following the CRCT isn't hard enough. Hang tough Dr. Hinojosa and school board members, and please remember not every child is lucky enough to have a stay-at-home mom and/or dad.. In this tough economy, we both work hard to bring home the bacon.

Stephanie December 9, 2011 at 12:25 pm

I, too, am a working mom, but volunteer a lot of time in my kids' elementary school. I was truly dismayed to hear of all of the increased absences for BOTH students and teachers compared to last year due to illnesses!! And I was saddened right before Thanksgiving break when talking with more than a few teachers, independently of each other, who emphasized their students' exhaustion as well as their own due to no significant break throughout the fall. There is a noticeable negative difference between this year and the last, they all kept saying. I hope that this committee includes informed and involved PARENTS and EDUCATORS along with administrative and business people!! All, I cannot emphasize enough, that ALL relevant stakeholder groups should be included. After this is for the future leaders and citizens of tomorrow!

Mike December 9, 2011 at 01:29 pm

The problem that we are facing is not that we disagree, but how we are disagreeing. The Superintendent has it partially correct. In my opinion the calendar committee needs to come up with 3 well thought out calendars and allow parents, teachers, and administration to pick our calendar since we all have to live by it. If we continue doing things as we have for the past couple years, we can expect the same results. This should not be a big fight.

Pam J December 9, 2011 at 02:04 pm

I'm confused. it seems like the kids had more time off with the other calendar. With the current calendar they have the week of Thanksgiving, two weeks at Christmas, and a week in April. The other calendar had a week in September and a week in February (if I remember correctly). So if it is easier to find childcare "during the breaks for Christmas and spring than for a week here and there", why don't you like the current calendar? I admit that maybe I'm missing something in your theory.

Andrea Young December 9, 2011 at 11:20 pm

I can work with the calendar either way, I really don't have a preference. Can we tackle the bigger problems in school, challenging the kids, making target more than one day a week, a working relationship between teacher parent and student, how Title 1 money is allocated, preparing children to compete in a global community...etc. REAL ISSUES

Lynn Louise Wonders, LPC, RPT-S December 10, 2011 at 02:27 pm

@Andrea, this is a "real issue." Perhaps you can go either way but the calendar issue is directly linked to absenteeism, quality of life for families, mental and physical health of students, teachers and parents. A well researched and carefully compiled citizen's report was presented to the board this year illustrating all these
points and is available for review. If someone has that link and wants to post it here it might be of interest to people. There are, of course, many "real issues" and there are a lot of parents observing and invested in everything our school board is addressing and not addressing.

Katherine December 11, 2011 at 04:55 pm

I agree with Lynn, this is a real issue in that it impacts test scores, absenteeism and the quality of the education our children receive. It is not just a "vacation" issue. It is also a sign on a bigger problem. If our Board Members are not listening to the community on this issue, will they listen to us on other important issues. They are there to represent us, and we need to make sure they have the interests of the community and our children in mind, not the interests of select groups that may benefit from decisions that impact our children.

Mit December 12, 2011 at 12:26 am

Hard to take someone who writes like this seriously.

Pam J December 12, 2011 at 12:45 am

Hey Mit, who are you referring to?

Mit December 12, 2011 at 12:51 am

Hey Pam, Vanessa had a garbled mess of a message attacking Debra for speaking out.

Kim January 3, 2012 at 09:13 pm

Did anyone notice that our children got out of school so close to Christmas that some families had issues with travel and now they are home and most families are paying DAYCARE...which is the same week of daycare they complained about...smart!

Jack S January 4, 2012 at 03:41 pm

No one sees the elephant in the room. The arguments going back and forth seem to be about "I" missed "my" vacation, or my child had to stay in school too many days in a row without a break. What day of the week or what month school starts is not relevant; it's how many days you are in school. Personally, I don't think week long breaks every month during the fall semester is constructive to learning. However, If you seriously want to get to the root of the problem, we all need to address Block Scheduling at some of our High Schools. If you haven't experienced this, you take four classes for 90 minutes or so a day for the entire semester. Then you take four different classes the next semester. Everyone should make A's, but we know that's hardly happening. Real, concrete numbers exist that show a disparity in Math scores on SAT and ACT exams between students in bock vs traditional scheduling. The concept isn't a bad one until your child is taking that Math 1-2-3 in the fall and had to wait until next fall before he sees math again. I don't know about y'all, but after 40 minutes, I start to get antsy and distracted and do you really think the teachers teach the entire block schedule? I'm going to run out of space if I start on absenteeism, but you get where this is going. My wish for the new year is 1) let our Board Members do what they were elected to do and make the hard decisions; (2) end this calendar thread from all versions of the Patch.