"The district has released a survey for community members to give their feedback on the proposed calendar. You can find the survey here."
Thursday night's Hamilton County Board of Education work session got a little heated.
"This is a nightmare," said District 1 board member Rhonda Thurman as the board's members were presented a draft of next year's school calendar. "This starting and stopping and starting and stopping is just too much."
Following a presentation by State Education Commissioner Candice McQueen on a new plan for five of the district's failing schools, the seven board members at Thursday's meeting heard about the draft calendar for the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 school year from Tim Hensley, a spokesman for the system's calendar committee, which was appointed in December.
The committee, made up of parents, community members and teachers, according to Hensley, has met several times to discuss key concerns with previous calendars, including short weeks with only two or three days, the number of professional development days, consistent breaks and more.
The proposed calendar would start school for the next year on Aug. 8, a Wednesday, and would give students a full week off in October for fall break - a promise previously made by the district - and a full week off at Thanksgiving. Spring Break for 2019 would fall in the third week of March, despite some community members' desire to match it with local private schools' breaks in the 4th week of March, according to Hensley.
The 2018-2019 school year would officially end for students on Thursday, May 23, 2019. The calendar also only provides five full professional development days for teachers and removes Presidents Day as a day off. The 2019-20 calendar is similar.
Board members, who will most likely be presented a calendar to vote on at next week's regularly scheduled board meeting, were most concerned with students having inconsistent schedules in the fall, with several breaks in the span of three months.
"I am not a proponent of fall break," said District 5 board vice chairman Karitsa Mosley Jones. "I always felt like it you were going to do it, you should do it during Thanksgiving and give the students those extra days then.
"This is three months back to back of breaks ... Get rid of fall break," she added.
Thurman agreed and emphasized her concerns with the burden such a calendar would put on parents, as well as the lack of community member input versus teacher input.
"This is not consumer-friendly," Thurman said. "We need to let the public see this and let the people who we are working for know what we are about to do."
The district does plan on sending out a public community survey now that the draft calendars have been presented to the board. The survey will be open until next board meeting so board members can be presented with the survey's findings.
District 2 board member Kathy Lennon, who was not at the meeting, also expressed concerns with the calendar in an email sent to the other board members.
"Why the full week for Thanksgiving? Students are out a full week [plus one day] in October. Go back for five weeks. Take a week off for Thanksgiving. Go back for four weeks. Take two weeks and two days off for Christmas Break. Is that what is best for students? That sounds like a nightmare for parents/families," Lennon wrote. "I am concerned for families that can't afford to take that much time off work and do not have or can't afford childcare."
The Times Free Press previously reported on local families' struggles to find childcare when schools were closed abruptly this winter for inclement weather. Hamilton County students missed five days this academic year due to weather, and schools are also closed today due to the flu's impact on the area.
"I do agree with Ms. Jones and Ms. Thurman," added board Chairman Steve Highlander. "For working parents, they have tremendous difficultly get[ting] adequate sitting ... a lot of people are concerned about trying to get childcare."
The board was previously presented a draft calendar last fall, and must vote to adopt a new version.
Contact Meghan Mangrum at mmangrum@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6592. Follow her on Twitter @memangrum.