Lansing teachers avoid pay cuts by agreeing to eliminate elementary school planning time

April 21, 2013 by

Writing in lansingstatejournal.com. Guillermo Lopez, president of the Lansing Board of Education, explained the recent decision to eliminate funding for special teachers in the elementary schools. He explained that the teachers were asked whether they would prefer to take a pay cut of about 15 percent over the next three years or eliminate teacher-planning time. At the elementary school level, the classroom teachers have 225 minutes of planning time per week when their classes are taught by an art, music, physical education, or media teacher.

The annual cost of replacing the classroom teacher with another teacher is approximately $6.2 million. The teachers chose to eliminate the planning time and need for a second teacher for their class instead of taking the pay cut. The result was that some people believed this was a plan to eliminate art, music, PE, and media in elementary schools. Not true! Every classroom teacher is already certified to teach all of these subjects in their grade level, and now will be teaching these subjects in the future. In fact, more than half of the special art, music, PE, and media teachers we were using do not have special endorsements in those areas.

Lopez said the school district plans to keep a group of specialized teachers “to work with the classroom teachers and to engage the arts community in the greater Lansing area to directly work with our students in each school.”

Filed Under: art education, music education, physical education, teacher planning time

Time and Learning Task Force proposed plan to give elementary school students a full day on Mondays

March 19, 2013 by

Since the early 1970’s, Fairfax County elementary school students have been dismissed early on Mondays so that teachers would have a block of time for planning and meetings. Originally students were dismissed 1 ½ hours early. Later this was increased to two hours or more. There have been various proposals keep the students in school on Monday afternoons while making other provisions for planning time for teachers.

In 1999 Project Excel provided full day Mondays for 16 elementary schools in Fairfax County.  However, the school board ended this program because the cost was considered too high. The last three schools which had the full day schedule switched back to early dismissals in September 2011.

Clearly it is time to reconsider some earlier models for full day Mondays that would not be as expensive as Project Excel.  The most recent proposal to provide full day Mondays for all elementary school students was presented to the Fairfax County School Board’s Instruction Committee May 2, 1996, by the Time and Learning Task Force. The Task Force proposed that each elementary school should be given the option of voluntarily choosing whether to provide a full-day on Monday for students and additional resource teachers for the school. Each school would design its own collaborative decision-making process to ensure broad school and community agreement. In my opinion this attempt to finesse the controversy of this issue is impractical. The school board has a responsibility to provide the best schedule for all students, and that clearly involves five full days of school for the students. On the other hand, I agree with the Task Force that a school which is planning for full day Mondays could be allowed to decide which types of resource teachers to hire. (They could also be given the option of hiring additional paraprofessionals.)

The Task Force noted that with a uniform 6.5-hour day Monday through Friday, students would gain a total of 2.5 weeks of additional instructional time per year.

Elementary School Weekly Schedules

Comparison of elementary schedules in the school year 1995-96 to the proposed changes recommended by the Time and Learning Task Force

Student activities  Grades 1 – 6

Current time
[1995-96]

Proposed total time

Proposed change
Subjects taught by classroom teacher 25 hours/week 25 hours/week none
Instruction by PE and music teachers

2. 5 hours/week

2 hours/week

-0.5 hour/week
Instruction by an art teacher

.5 hour/week[1]

1 hour/week

+.5 hour/week
Additional resource teachers identified by school (e.g., reading, math, computer, science, foreign language, health, music, PE.)

none

2 hours/week

+2 hours/week
Subtotal of instructional time 28 hours/week 30 hours/week +2 hours/week
Lunch 2.5 hours/week 2.5 hours/week none
TOTAL student time in school 30.5 hours/week 32.5 hours/week +2 hours/week

The total time mandated for music, art, and PE instruction each week by specialists is the same under the proposal as it was under the 1995-96 schedule: 3 hours.

  • Music—minimum of two 30-minute sessions each week, for a total of 60 minutes.
  • PE—minimum of two 30-minute sessions each week, for a total of 60 minutes.
  • Art—minimum of one 60-minute session each week. This is an objective the School Board has been working towards even without any increase in time for students.
  • Under the Task Force proposal, the additional time for instruction by specialists to be chosen by each school is 2 hours. The school could choose resource teachers for reading, math, science, a foreign language, computers, health, or other subjects. The school would have the option of choosing to have additional instruction above the mandated amounts for music, PE, or art.
  • The Task Force said that schools should choose measures to reduce fragmentation in the student schedule. For example, language arts instruction by the special education teacher could be scheduled during the time the classroom teacher is covering this subject.

Under the Task Force proposal, kindergarten teachers and specialists would be guaranteed five hours of weekly planning time. [All kindergarten classes were half-day at that time.]

Teacher planning time
Grades 1 – 6

Current
[1995-96]

Proposed total

Proposed change

 
Planning time during student day 2.5 hours/week 5 hours/week +2.5 hours/week
     music and PE teachers

2.5 hours/week

2 hours/week

-0.5 hour/week
     art teachers

none[2]

1 hour/week

+1 hour/week
     additional resource teachers

none

2 hours/week

+ 2 hours/week
Planning time before and after the student day (including Monday afternoon) 7 hours/week 5 hours/week -2 hours/week
TOTAL planning time 9.5 hours/week 10 hours/week +0.5 hour/week

Under the Time and Learning Task Force proposal, each participating school must provide a minimum of five hours of planning time per week within the student day for every full-time teacher, with a minimum of two of the five hours provided for grade-level or team planning.

Schools would need to develop alternatives for a school-based staff development delivery system other than designated Mondays.

Cost

Although the Task Force did not recommend mandatory implementation in all elementary schools, it estimated the total costs if all schools adopted the schedule to be in the range of $11- $13 million per year.

[1] The art teacher visited each class approximately every other week for one hour under the 1995-96 schedule.

[2] The 1995-96 model for art instruction was that the classroom teacher stays in the class with the art teacher. (However, in some schools, the art specialist time was used as planning time for the classroom teacher.)

Note: This is a revised version of a post I wrote two years ago.

Filed Under: art education, early dismissals, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, school day, school schedules, teacher planning time

Arts Education Working Group stresses importance of arts education

March 10, 2013 by

Three years ago, The Arts Education Working Group, a coalition of national arts and arts education advocacy organizations including the Americans for the Arts Action Fund, invited state and local organizations to join the movement to keep the arts in public schools by signing-on to a statement in support of arts education: Arts Education: Creating Student Success in School Work and Life. Here is an excerpt from this four-page statement:

  • The Arts Prepare Students for School, Work, and Life
    As this country works to strengthen our foothold in the 21st Century global economy, the artsequip students with a creative, competitive edge. To succeed in today’s economy of ideas,students must masterfully use words, images,sounds, and movement to communicate. The arts provide the skills and knowledge students need to develop the creativity and determination necessary for success in today’s global information age.
  •  The Arts Strengthen the Learning Environment
    Where schools and communities are delivering high-quality learning opportunities in, through, and about the arts for children, extraordinary results occur. A study by the Arts Education Partnership, Third Space: When Learning Matters, finds that schools with large populations of students in economic poverty – too often places of frustration and failure for both students and teachers – can be transformed into vibrant hubs of learning when the arts are infused into their culture and curriculum. Additionally, studies have found that 8th graders from under-resourced environments who are highly involved in the arts have better grades, less likelihood of dropping out by grade 10, have more positive attitudes about school, and are more likely to go on to college.
  • The Arts Can Attract and Retain Teachers Who Love to Teach
    Attracting and retaining our best teachers is a daunting challenge. It can be met, however, by ensuring schools embrace the arts. Schools, especially those struggling, can attract new educators and keep their best teachers by becoming havens for creativity and innovation; places where students want to learn and teachers want to teach. As we aim to improve the teaching environment, the arts can help us retain our outstanding future and current educators in our nation’s schools.
Filed Under: art education, music education, Uncategorized

There are many ways of providing affordable time for students

February 6, 2013 by

Katie Fox explains how schools can afford more time for students.  “The underlying answer is if there is a will, there is a way,” she says in her post for the Time to Succeed Coalition.

How about it Fairfax County School Board? Is there a will? One you have the will, there will be a way. Obviously one way is eliminating Monday early dismissals and providing alternative teacher planning time.

Fox points out that specialist instructors for elective courses can provide planning time for teachers:

One factor to consider is flexible scheduling for teachers and staff. While students might be in school for additional time or days, staggering teacher schedules is one way to maintain the workload and compensation for teachers. Bringing in specialized instructors for elective courses can also help allow for more opportunities in the arts, music, drama, and technology while also freeing up instructors in the core classes for planning and collaboration time….

Filed Under: art education, music education, teacher planning time

It’s time to provide five full days of school for Fairfax elementary school students

January 23, 2013 by

“Dorothy Bea’s two grandchildren were latchkey kids just one day each week, on Mondays,” Peter Baker reported in the Washington Post, January 26, 1989.  “Three days ago, during one of those periods at home alone, Bea’s unattended grandson found her loaded .32-caliber revolver buried deep in a bedroom drawer and fatally shot his sister.”

This article is titled “If It’s Monday, It Must Be Latchkey; Fairfax Schools’ Early Closing Each Week Worries Some Parents.”

I was one of the people that Baker quoted:

“It just worries me,” said Virginia Shea, a parent of two small children in the Lincolnia area, who cares for a neighbor’s second-grade daughter every Monday because of the early closing at Weyanoke Elementary. “It seems to me that with the number of mothers who work in Fairfax County that really should be carefully looked at. I just can’t help feeling that the safety of the kids has to take priority over the convenience of the teachers.”

Four months later Fairfax Superintendent Robert R. Spillane proposed that the school system stop dismissing students early on Mondays. In November of that year, the school board considered a plan to lengthen school hours with a seven-period day for secondary school students and full Mondays for elementary school students. The school board members approved the longer day for secondary school students, but said they would wait until the next year to do the same for elementary students, citing the $8.8 million cost of the program. This money would have paid for 220 additional teachers for art, music, and physical education.

On Monday, September 17, 1990, eight-year old Destiny Souza returned home from Newington Forest Elementary School at 1:20 p.m. When her mother returned home from work at 3:30 p.m., she found that Destiny had been beaten to death. Her murderer was later convicted and sentenced to a life term.

On November 15, 1990, the school board narrowly defeated Dr. Spillane’s revised plan to provide a full day on Monday for elementary school students while providing classroom teachers with larger blocks of planning time during the student day. The cost of the rejected proposal was $5.6 million for 128.5 additional teacher positions.

This year Superintendent Jack D. Dale is proposing adding $6.5 million to the budget for additional time for teachers without any additional time for elementary school students. It is time to remember the needs of the students.

Today, January 23, is the anniversary of the tragic shooting of the seven-year-old student from Springfield Estates Elementary school. Clearly it is time to provide full day Mondays for the elementary school students.

[The last paragraph was slightly edited since my original posting this morning.]

Filed Under: art education, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, safety, teacher planning time

Cost of teacher planning time has been cited as the reason Fairfax does not provide full day Mondays

January 18, 2013 by

Since 1989 I have studied the scheduling issues in Fairfax County Public Schools. There have been several proposals during that time to provide full day Mondays for all of the elementary school students. These proposals involved various ways of allowing the classroom teachers to have planning time while the students were being taught by other teachers of music, art, or physical education. Other proposals have broadened the choices to include other specialists or paraprofessionals.

The main reason cited for failing to approve these plans has been fairly consistent: Fairfax County cannot afford to pay for additional planning time for the classroom teachers, even though the students would benefit during that time by instruction by other specialists. When faced with the option of spending a modest amount of additional money, a majority of the school board members have clung to the questionable premise that the very best solution for providing planning time for teachers is to send the children out of the building.

Starting in 1999, 20 schools were given additional resources in Project Excel. Sixteen of the schools chose to have full day Mondays for the students. Under this program, teachers, counselors, librarians, and instructional assistants added a half-hour to their workday so they had an 8-hour contract day and their pay was increased by seven percent.  This method of providing more planning time for the staff was much more expensive than the previous proposals. A couple of years ago Project Excel was eliminated.

So both options of providing alternative planning time have been rejected as too expensive.

That is why it is so discouraging to see that Superintendent Jack D. Dale is now saying, yes let’s have $6.5 million worth of additional teacher contract time; but no, let’s not even mention the idea that students could have full day Mondays. Not only is this missing an opportunity to provide more time for the students–if approved by the school board, this would make it even harder to ever figure out a way of doing so in the future.

I know that in the perception of many school members, once the teachers have additional planning time, that won’t be counted as an offset to any future method of providing alternative planning time for teachers while allowing more time in school for the students. That new proposal will have to come up with additional planning time over and above any additional planning time that is added now.

Moving the goal posts.

This is unfair to the students.

Note: This is a slightly revised version of the original post that was published earlier this morning.

Filed Under: art education, early dismissals, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, school schedules, teacher planning time

Elementary school students in Fairfax need more time in school

January 11, 2013 by

“Don’t Forget the Students.” Four years ago that was the title of my testimony on the budget for Fairfax County Public Schools. I am more worried than ever that the students are being forgotten. Why is Superintendent Dale proposing paying teachers for additional contract time without students while completely ignoring the needs of the elementary school students for a better school schedule? Here is my testimony from 2009:

Virginia Fitz Shea
Statement to the Fairfax County School Board
Public Hearing on the FY 2010 Advertised Budget
January 21, 2009

Don’t Forget the Students!

Twenty years ago two students from Springfield Estates Elementary School were taken care of after school by their uncle, who returned from work at 3:00 p.m. However, on Mondays their school dismissed them at 1:10 p.m. and they took care of themselves until their uncle’s return. At about 2:30 p.m. on Monday, January 23, 1989, the eight-year-old brother found a gun and fatally shot his six-year-old sister.

In November of that year, Fairfax Superintendent Robert R. Spillane proposed a plan to lengthen school hours with a seven-period day for secondary school students and full Mondays for elementary school students. The school board members approved the longer day for secondary school students, but said they would wait until the next year to do the same for elementary students, citing the $8.8 million cost of the program. This money would have paid for 220 additional teachers for art, music, and physical education.

On Monday, September 17, 1990, eight-year old Destiny Souza returned home from Newington Forest Elementary School at 1:20 p.m. When her mother returned home from work at 3:30 p.m., she found that Destiny had been beaten to death. Her murderer was later convicted and sentenced to a life term.

On November 15, 1990, the school board narrowly defeated Dr. Spillane’s revised plan to provide a full day on Monday for elementary school students while providing classroom teachers with larger blocks of planning time during the student day. The cost of the rejected proposal was $5.6 million for 128.5 additional teacher positions.

If such a plan were implemented today, the costs would be greater due to inflation and increased enrollment; however it would still be more affordable than Project Excel, which covers only 20 schools and costs $7 ½   million this year. Sixteen of the Project Excel schools provide full day Mondays for students and the other four schools have modified calendars.

According to the proposed 2010 budget, the Project Excel program will be reduced by $1.48 million, a reduction of 20 percent. However, the budget states, “A project team is designing a process for identification and support of high-needs schools to replace Excel using existing (but reduced) budgets.”

So if Project Excel will be replaced, that means it is being eliminated. The budget should make this clear. The “Potential Tiered Budget Reductions Impacts” document states “Fewer schools will be served due to the reduction of funds and all elementary schools will revert to the same calendar, with early dismissal on Monday.”

Why is this statement left out of the 268-page proposed budget for 2010? Why is the alternative to Excel being developed by means of a secretive internal staff review? Parents deserve a chance to comment on the proposal to eliminate the full day on Monday.

Either one of Dr. Spillane’s proposals should be substituted for the expensive Project Excel method of providing full day Mondays and provide longer Mondays for additional schools.  Additional money in the budget for teacher planning time could be reallocated to provide funding for full day Mondays for all the schools.

Let’s remember the students!

Past, Present, and Future

Filed Under: art education, early dismissals, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, teacher planning time

Update for the Fairfax Reform Plan

December 14, 2012 by

Fairfax County should end its policy of dismissing all elementary school students two hours early every Monday. There are many different methods of achieving this goal. Some are no cost (simply switch the bell schedules) and some are quite expensive.

I created a separate page in this blog as a reference point for considering one example of a revised schedule. Today I am revising this proposal to incorporate the Foreign Language in Elementary School (FLES) program.

Reform Plan for Fairfax County Elementary School Schedules

  • Eliminate the two-hour early dismissals of students each week
  • Hire paraprofessionals (recess monitors) to be in charge of the class during recess one day each week for 30 minutes. This would give each classroom teacher an extra 30 minutes per week for planning during the time students are in school.
  • Add 30 minutes of physical education (P.E.) to the current 60 minutes of P.E., for a total of 90 minutes of P.E. Classroom teachers add this to their planning time.
  • Add 30 minutes of music or another subject taught by a specialist to the schedules of those elementary schools that already have 90 minutes of P.E. Classroom teachers add this to their planning time.
  • Schools which already have the Foreign Language in Elementary School (FLES) program should change the method of instruction. Currently the FLES teacher comes into the classroom twice a week for 30 minutes each session to team teach with the classroom teacher. Instead of using the team teaching approach, allow the classroom teacher to have planning time.
  • Schools which don’t already have FLES could choose to add it to their schedule or choose to add 60 minutes of instruction by other specialists.

 Overall change in time for classroom teachers

Although teachers would lose two hours of planning/professional development time after the student day on Mondays, they would gain an extra 120 minutes of planning time during the student week

Cost

In 1996 the Time and Learning Task Force proposed hiring specialist teachers for the additional two hours that students would be in school.  If all elementary schools had adopted that proposal, the cost estimate was for $11-13 million. FCPS has not given any updated cost estimates for that specific proposal.

This proposal calls for hiring specialist teachers to cover 90 minutes of the additional time, but to hire paraprofessionals for a 30 minute recess period one day a week. Schools which already have the FLES program would only need to hire specialists to cover an additional 30 minutes of time each week as well as paraprofessionals to cover one 30 minute recess period for each class.

See also Foreign language instruction could be part of a restructuring of the elementary school week.

Filed Under: early dismissals, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, teacher planning time

Cleveland school board restores full school day

November 30, 2012 by

On November 7 cleveland.com reported,”Cleveland schoolchildren will have 50 minutes returned to their school day in January, after East Side voters overwhelmed West Side opposition to give the district more money Tuesday.”

Last spring the district reduced art, music, and gym glasses to shorten the school day for grades K-8.

Filed Under: art education, music education, physical education, school day

Chicago to add specialists to create a longer day

July 25, 2012 by

Chicago Public Schools will hire 477  specialist teachers to allow elementary school students to have a seven-hour school day while their teachers continue to work seven-hour days. Currently most of the elementary school students are in school for 5 hours and 45 minutes each day.

High school students will increase their time in school from seven hours to 7 1/2 hours, while their teachers will work an additional 14 minutes per day.

Compared to Chicago, Fairfax County is an embarrassment. The Fairfax County School Board isn’t even trying to fix the inadequate elementary school schedule. Also, the school board may flub the chance to choose a new superintendent who is willing and able to lead the way to a better schedule.

The Chicago Tribune reports that the agreement announced Tuesday is a sign of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s political pragmatism. “In April he made a concession to opponents of the longer day by shaving 30 minutes off the original plan for a 71/2-hour school day for elementary students.”

Meanwhile, Fairfax County elementary school students must make do with an average school day of 6 hours and 10 minutes. There have been several proposals to hire additional specialist teachers as part of a restructuring of the elementary school schedule to eliminate Monday early dismissals. The most recent major proposal was made by the Time and Learning Task Force in 1996. It’s time to dust off these old proposals, update them, and make a decision in time for the 2013-14 school year.

Here is the press release from Chicago:

School Year to Start on Time with the Full School Day  

CPS and CTU work in collaboration to negotiate key proposal as part of ongoing contract negotiation, ensuring Full School Day moves forward as planned for students

July 24, 2012

Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and Chicago Teachers’ Union (CTU) have reached an interim, binding agreement to guarantee that Chicago’s students start this school year with the Full School Day that they need to excel. This agreement will ensure that all students will start the year with a Full School Day at 7 hours in elementary and 7.5 hours in high schools, providing additional instructional time that will help get them on par with their peers across the country. The school day for students will remain as is under the current Full School Day proposal.

“When we make our kids our first priority, we can find a way forward,” said Mayor Rahm Emanuel. “This agreement is the binding guarantee that our students will have a full school day on day one this year, providing them with the time and the education they need to excel.”

The announced agreement will allow students to benefit from full implementation of the Full School Day at the start of School Year (SY) 2012-2013 without any increase to the teacher work day for elementary teachers, and an increase of only 14 additional minutes on average per day for high school teachers. [Read more...]

Filed Under: art education, lunch, Monday early dismissal, music education, physical education, school day, school schedules, school year, teacher planning time
«Older Posts