Schools seeking calendar changes
By Steve Herring
Published in News on January 16, 2015 1:46 PM
Changes to a law designed to benefit North Carolina's tourism industry are hindering the education of the state's children, Wayne County Board of Education members said.
And Monday night, board Chairman Chris West called on the public "to lean real heavy on the ear" of local state legislators to undo those changes.
Since the changes limit the calendar-making authority of local school boards, schools cannot complete their first semester prior to the Christmas break, board members said.
That means a potentially harmful lag time of weeks between finishing the semester and testing, they said.
While some board members skated around the reason for the changes, board member Rick Pridgen said that the public needs to realize that the tourism industry was "driving that horse."
"(The legislators) need to take a stand that education is just as important as tourism in my opinion," West said.
Board member Jennifer Strickland asked if Aug. 24 was the earliest that classes could start.
It is, said Allison Pridgen, the school system's executive director for administrative services.
"The hard part for us is that there is very little flexibility in the calendar law as it stands now," said David Lewis, assistant superintendent for accountability/information and technology services/athletic director. "For example, someone was asking about starting school early enough to get exams in before Christmas break.
State law does not allow a school system to begin classes any earlier than the Monday closest to Aug. 26. The end date can be no later than the Friday closest to June 11.
"So we are bound as to just how early we can get going," Lewis said. "So that means we cannot finish first semester prior to Christmas break. You'd pretty much have to skip Thanksgiving, and I don't think anybody is going to go for that."
Dr. Dwight Cannon asked if testing after the holidays was pertinent to the issue.
"You see, now we test after the holiday," board member Pat Burden said. "Prior to this new law, we tested and then went on holiday. That was much better for students and for staff because you were not coming back after a holiday, and you have not had an opportunity to do a great deal of review, and you go right into testing.
"It is very unfair for the students. They are the ones being tested and need to pass,"
Mrs. Burden asked about the status of the General Assembly allowing local school districts to establish their own starting and ending dates.
"The reason I ask that is because of the testing," she said.
It is still under study, Interim Superintendent Dr. Sandra McCullen said.
"There are some groups that are going to the General Assembly this year that say it has the best chance of passing ever," she said.
If that measure were to pass, the school board would amend the calendar, Mrs. Pridgen said.
"We need to give these children, these students every opportunity to succeed," West said. "They can argue until the sun goes down. There is no argument that says they cannot better retain the knowledge if they take the exam before they leave and go out on a 10- or 12-day Christmas vacation.
"Maybe it is too much common sense. We just need to lean heavy on those guys in Raleigh because this is something they can do something about and that they need to do something about because we need to give (the students) every opportunity to score as well as they can."