[Youth-list] School Calendar Changes

[JMRab at aol.com]

     (http://www.courant.com/)    
____________________________________
 
_http://www.courant.com/news/education/hc-hfdboe0321.artmar21,0,6312334.story?coll=hc-headlines-education_ 
(http://www.courant.com/news/education/hc-hfdboe0321.artmar21,0,6312334.story?coll=hc-headlines-education)  


Changes Made In School Calendar 

City Board Hopes For Improvement In Student Test  Performance 

By  RACHEL GOTTLIEB
Courant Staff Writer

March 21 2007

School  will begin before Labor Day in Hartford next school year, the 
traditional  February break will move to the end of March and youngsters in grades 1  
through 3 who are reading below grade level will have four weeks of  
mandatory summer school, the school board decided Tuesday  night.

The changes in the calendar for the next two years are  designed to raise 
student achievement by increasing the number of days of  instruction before 
youngsters take the Connecticut Mastery Test and  increasing the total number of 
days that students are in  school.

"While being the lowest-achieving school district in the  state, we have the 
fewest number of days of instruction before the state  assessment," said 
School Superintendent Steven Adamowski.

The  schedule increases instructional time by 2.5 days - from 176.5 to 179 - 
by  eliminating five of nine half-days that were used for teacher training.  
That teacher training in the new calendar will be in August, before  students 
return to school, and in June, after school lets out.

The  board did not need to negotiate the teacher-training change with the  
teachers' union, union President Cathy Carpino said, because the schedule  does 
not ask teachers to work more than 187 days called for in their  contract.

Teachers objected to some of the proposed calendar  changes, and the board 
compromised on some issues next year. But it  approved a calendar for the 
following year that adheres more closely to  Adamowski's proposal.

Next year, teachers will report for training  on Aug. 27 and 28, and students 
will report Aug. 29 - giving youngsters  three days of instruction before 
Labor Day.

But in 2008-09,  students will have five days of instruction before Labor 
Day. 

The  mandatory summer school for students reading below grade level will be  
four weeks after the next year and five weeks the following  year.

Adamowski has expressed outrage over the fact that only 15  percent of 
third-graders in city schools can read at their grade level.  Beyond third grade, he 
said, it's more difficult to teach students to  read. The board did not honor 
Carpino's request to keep what the district  calls "spring break" in February 
- just before three weeks of state  testing that begins in early March. 
Instead, the break will move to late  March, after the testing.  
Copyright 2007, _Hartford Courant_ (http://www.courant.com/)    
____________________________________
      

Janice M. Gruendel, Ph.D.
Governor's Senior Advisor on Early  Childhood
Co-Chair, CT Early Childhood Education Cabinet
Senior Youth  Consultant
United Way of CT & Office for Workforce  Competitiveness
Home office: 203-481-9940
Blackberry: 203-824-4766
Mail  to: 28 Juniper Point
Branford, CT 06405

"In the  midst of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible 
summer."  Albert Camus



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