As the Palo Alto school board approaches the touchy subject of determining an academic calendar for the school year 2014-15 and beyond, members will hold a special study session Tuesday, May 28, to discuss “calendar planning values.”
The afternoon meeting precedes a regular evening board meeting at which the board will discuss the future of Cubberley Community Center as well as a recommendation by Superintendent Kevin Skelly to postpone a decision on opening a new elementary school until spring of 2014.
The board is set to vote this fall on future calendars in the midst of a recently adopted change that moved the start of the school year to mid-August in order to squeeze the full first semester in before the December holidays. The change applies to the current school year as well as to academic year 2013-14.
An early survey of students, parents and school staff indicated considerable satisfaction among high school students with the new calendar, which is similar to those adopted in recent years by surrounding public and private high schools.
But at least one school board member has expressed skepticism about the change, and the move has been strongly opposed by some parents. The board member who provided the swing vote for the 3-2 approval of the new calendar in May 2011, Barbara Klausner, is no longer on the board.
A calendar advisory committee of parents, school staff and students, representing a spectrum of views, was to analyze the survey responses and generate options for calendars for 2014-15 and beyond.
Calendar advisory committee members are elementary parents Amy Kacher, Stuart Friedman, Lance Martin and Kathy Jordan; middle-school parents Susan Usman and Howard Lee; high-school parents Mukund Sreenivasan and Tekla Nee; teachers Laurie Pennington, Abby Bradski, Michele Ketcham and Debbie Whitson; students Justice Tention, Sarah Dukes-Schlossberg, Neel Guha and Jessica Feinberg and administrators Trinity Klein from Gunn High School and Greg Barnes from Jordan Middle School. The facilitator is the district’s Assistant Superintendent for Human Resources Scott Bowers.
Tuesday’s study session on calendar values begins at 12:30 p.m. in the boardroom of school district headquarters, 25 Churchill Ave.
Following a 5 p.m. closed session to discuss legal matters, the regular meeting will convene at 6:30 p.m., also in the boardroom.
The Weekly missed this important story: http://www.paloaltoonline.com/square/index.php?i=3&d=&t=20961#add_comments
I am not sure whether the Weekly’s education reporter understands the importance of this issue, since the Mercury News covered the fact that Palo Alto is ignored the new “fee for learning” law several months ago. Why does it seem like the Weekly is regularly getting scooped by grassroots reporters on its own website. Pretty embarrassing if you ask me.
How about covering the fact that the district is making poor kids pay for stuff they are barred by law from charging for? That seems like a bigger and better story than a story that recites the school board agenda with no interviews, no quotes, and no reporting of any kind. But that’s just me.
This paragraph seems almost deliberately obtuse: “But at least one school board member has expressed skepticism about the change, and the move has been strongly opposed by some parents. The board member who provided the swing vote for the 3-2 approval of the new calendar in May 2011, Barbara Klausner, is no longer on the board.”
In fact, Camille Townsend and Melissa Caswell voted against the calendar change, and Heidi Emberling opposed it during the election. Townsend and Tom (who supported the calendar) got into a tiff about the survey data at the last board meeting. Why be so coy? You shouldn’t have to already know the facts to understand the story.
@J-school dropout. Also not appearing in this story is any mention of the fact that the other item on consent, in addition to the above-mentioned state-law-breaking fees, is the renewal and increase of Laurie Reynolds’ contract as district counsel. Laurie Reynolds is apparently using PAUSD’s evident disregard for the law as her own veritable gold mine, obtaining a 40% increase in her contract over last year due to the increase in matters and billings according to Cathy Mak (at the last board meeting). She charges us to dig the hole, and then to fill it in. Convenient. And only the bargain billing rate of $270 per hour! That makes PAUSD the golden goose, with its inability to understand or follow the law. Or maybe the golden fleece. One of those.
“An early survey of students, parents and school staff indicated considerable satisfaction among high school students with the new calendar”
Actually, the survey showed “considerable” satisfaction among students, faculty, and parents for the new calendar. Between 65% and 90% of all respondents in each group preferred “finals before christmas”, i.e., the new calendar.
So, I think the only real question is finding a way to start school a bit later in August…
We had a strange Memorial weekend. Our senior was on a high having finished and apart from a Sunday baccalaureate, he had no reason to go to school on Friday, and this week is party central. For our younger student, he had a weekend of study with the prospect of three hectic days of school.
Is this a normal Memorial weekend for Paly families with more than one student? Are we normally expected to attend school events on a holiday weekend?
I don’t mind the studies for younger students – we have done that before. But why couldn’t the rehearsal be on Friday rather than early this morning?
What do other families feel about this week of school?
The board is always making the mistake of trying to make everybody happy. That is never going to happen in this town. And the parents keep screaming that they aren’t being heard. They can’t accept that they WERE heard just the decision went against them. They can’t except not getting their way.
In previous message replace “except” with “accept”
Don’t forget to fill out the Superintendent Survey! – It’s open until June 4.
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/Supt360
@Paly Parent: One very good reason why graduation rehearsal couldn’t take place on Friday is that many some senior classes were giving finals that day.