A special meeting of the Winslow Unified School District governing board was held last week for the purpose of discussing changes in the 2018-2019 school schedule. “We surveyed our teaching staff,” Superintendent Cyndie Mattox said, “and asked if they would like to keep our current schedule of two weeks break in the spring and two weeks in the fall.”
Also discussed on the survey were school day length and summer vacation. She explained that teachers overwhelmingly agreed to keep the current schedule for next year. The maintenance, transportation and custodial departments had different results. “When we added those results, it was about dead even on what they wanted.” Maintenance and transportation employees have expressed that the longer breaks allow them to tackle time consuming projects. Extending the summer break would allow for even more. “There is a lot to do in the summer,” Mattox said, “they can’t get a building painted inside during the school year and they want to take vacations too. A longer summer would help prepare our buildings.”
A member of the superintendent’s advisory committee and Winslow Junior High School teacher Sharon Vasquez said, “I don’t want to go back to a traditional schedule because they have such a long break in the summer time that you are actually reteaching them. Honestly, 10 to 11 weeks off in the summer is not best for kids.”
Mattox added, “Some teachers have said that they can’t get a summer job if the summer is shorter.” To that Board President Sharon Greenwood added, “Or take a summer class.”
Another of the concerns surrounding a potential change is spring testing. “We have two weeks off in March and start the AZMerit (statewide achievement test) test in April so maybe we could look at having only one week off in March,” Vasquez said. Other educators agreed that not having enough time to prepare for testing is a concern.
CTE (Career and Technical Education) Director Penny Brimhall pointed out, “When we have our two week breaks, NAVIT (Northern Arizona Vocational Institute of Technology) or TALON (Technology to Advance Learning and Outcome at Northland) students and their families are not considered.” She explained that those programs follow the schedule of Northland Pioneer College (NPC) so students enrolled in them through Winslow High School get no breaks.
It was made clear by the governing board that no changes in the school schedule would be decided upon in the meeting. However, the discussion continued with educators and board members speaking on the topic. Board Vice President Joe Harnett said, “What I am hearing in the community is that elementary teachers want the two week break and the junior high and high school teachers want the shorter break. I would say a hybrid of that say, one week in the spring and two weeks in the fall could work.”
Board member Al Leonard asked, “When we went to the two week break schedule, we did it with the intention that the first week would be intervention, but that is no longer happening.” Intervention is academic tutoring provided to students not meeting requirements in their classes. He continued, “If we don’t have summer school or intervention, where will the kids that were benefiting from intervention get the extra help?”
Mattox answered, “We talked about forming after school tutoring with an activities bus to get them back home, and feed them dinner as well.” WJHS Principal Darlene McCauley suggested an extended day and a tutoring program to reach out to those students who need it. Student Advisor Deb Lopez explained that there are grants available to help pay for such programs.
Changing school schedules does carry implications. One of those is the nutritional needs of Winslow students. Some rely on the breakfast and lunch programs available at Winslow schools. Those programs may not be possible with a longer summer, and would have to be modified with a longer school day.
Sports schedules are another hurdle in changing the length of breaks. Other schools that compete with Winslow in sports do not follow the same schedule, so student athletes often practice and have games during breaks.
Business Manager Shirley Lomeli alerted the board to the payroll concerns that could occur with a schedule change. “We need time to be able to make sure that the employees understand that their pay schedules would be different.”
The discussion is not over. Board members did decide to assign Mattox the task of putting together variable schedule scenarios. More notably, they made the decision to implement whichever changes are decided upon into the 2018-19 school year, which currently begins in August.
Parent Natalie Barros mentioned the need for the board to seek advice and input from parents. McKee said, “Not everyone has computer access so the survey would have to be sent out on paper as well.” The governing board agreed to garnering input from the community.
Also discussed was the move toward a four day school week. Reasons for and against the change were given and closely matched those given on the calendar changing. A major concern however, was that statistically with a four day school day, students do not show up at all on Thursdays. That, of course, would be a hindrance on their education and will be taken in to consideration moving forward. Discussion will continue at the next meeting of the board. No action was taken during the meeting, with the board ultimately deciding to do more research on the subject.
One action item was on the agenda for the special meeting. The board voted to institute a swimming program at WHS. It is not clear whether that program will be competitive or strictly instructional as the athletic director for WHS was attending parent teacher conferences during the meeting therefore unable to comment. More details will be reported as they become available.
The next meeting of the Winslow Unified School District Governing Board will be held at 6 p.m. on Thursday, March 15, in the district offices, located at 800 Apache Ave. in Winslow. The public is invited to attend.
