Spring Branch Makes Decision on Make-Up Days: A Creative Solution that is Instructionally Sound

This morning, our Board met and made the following decision regarding make-up days related to Hurricane Ike (Click here for the Agenda of today's meeting):

For middle and high schools, to gain back instructional time, teachers will not administer final exams during the first semester.  Instead, teachers will administer unit exams or assign projects as a way to assess student mastery of content.  As a result, December 17th and 18th will become full instructional days instead of half days devoted only to exams.  In addition, it is anticipated that 3 - 4 days of instructional time will be gained that previously would have been used for review/prep for finals.

For elementary schools, in order to gain back instructional time, October 23rd and 24th, which were previously early release half days will be full instructional days.

In making this determination, the District looked at several far less palatable solutions, including:

1. Extending the first semester until after Winter Break with first semester finals in January;
2. Going to school on Saturdays;
3. Reducing the number of holidays including impacting Thanksgiving and/or the Winter Break;
4. Eliminating Spring Break and/or Good Friday;
5. Adding an additional hour to each school day.

I think we are fortunate that our Administration made this recommendation that is clearly the best instructional choice for our students and our community.

Update:  Click here for the posting of additional information about this decision on the District's website, including the Amended 2008-2009 School Calendar.

Comments

[Bob King]

It is a creative and a popular decision. But I am not sure I agree with this on principle.

If what we are saying is that final exams are not instructional in nature, I think that will be pretty big news in the academic world. I doubt that Harvard, Stanford, Yale, Cambridge, Oxford, et al are going to re-visit their instructional procedures because of this situational logic on SBISD's part.

And if final exams and prepping for them are non-instructional this semester, then why would they ever be instructional in any future semester? We could shrink the whole school year by about two additional weeks with the benefit of this philosophical breakthrough.

And why stop there? Getting rid of all testing could give the kids Fridays off all year, it would seem.

Sorry for the sarcasm, but it seems to me that Ike has put SBISD's commitment to academic rigor in opposition to parental conveniences (and by this I mean, mainly, ski trips and summer vacations). So we chose convenience. I think it's a creative rationalization and yet another example of our society's inability to do hard and inconvenient things. I cannot imagine my parents and their elected representatives making the same decision when I was in school.

The kids are ECSTATIC about the decision. Apparently, so also are a number of parents and teachers. But I think it says something unfortunate about all of our priorities.

[Madelaine Morris]

This is a brilliant upon brilliant idea! Without any further family or community sacrifices, our AP college bound seniors will still receive the instructional time needed for preparation for the national exams. Bravo!!

[Patty]

Great decision. As always, thank you Mike for keeping us posted and well informed on issues that affect our children's education.

[Lisa Slattery]

As a teacher and a parent, I am very pleased with this solution. We get our week of instructional time back without giving up family time. Great thinking!

[Claire Martin]

I am so pleased with the Board of SBISD!!! What a great solution. It achieves so many objectives and creates a win-win situation for both administration and students. It is an "out-of-the-box" thought process that reflects the efforts of a caring, creative and hard-working Board. Thank you!!!

[Robert Stevenson, CPA]

Mike,
My compliments to the board and Dr. Klussmann for doing the right thing.