School Calendar Approved, But Not Without Criticism

The school board approved the calendar for the upcoming school year, but not without registering reservations.

The final vote was 3-2, with trustees Doug Metz and Dawn Ovrom voting no on Thursday.

The calendar for the 2012-13 year didn’t follow all of the guidelines approved at the board’s November meeting, which were based on input from three public forums last fall.

Ovrom took specific umbrage to a 21-day disparity between the fall and spring semesters, when the guidelines said that it should be no more than 15 days.

But to achieve this, the school year had to begin a week earlier, and the Association of Coronado Teachers (ACT) said no. “They were adamant about this,” said Rebekah Barakos-Cartwright, the district’s human resource director.

Even trustees who voted for the calendar expressed displeasure in the final product. “I’m not happy,” Ledyard Hakes said.

“The disregard for the recommendations of the parents and teachers who attended the forums represents a slap in the face of the community and this board,” Metz said.

Input from teachers and parents had convinced the committee a short fall semester was detrimental for middle school and high school students, especially for semester-long courses, such as economics, and for Advanced Placement testing, which takes place in the spring.

The majority of teachers thought otherwise, though union leaders applauded the work done at the forums.

“They worked hard and should be valued for that,” said Tamara O’Brien, ACT co-president. But at the end of the day, it is the “teachers who know how their students learn and how they react in a classroom.”

The district had made it clear that the work produced at the forums would lead to recommendations, not final policy. Superintendent Jeffrey Felix had noted the school calendar had to be negotiated with ACT before it was finalized.

Still hosting the forums was an attempt to bring some transparency to the process, Barakos-Cartwright said.

“We wanted to open up the conversation, so that the voice of the community was considered,” she said.

Ovrom said she received a number of e-mails from teachers and parents complaining about the final calendar. “There will be community push back on this,” she said.

Felix understands that might happen. He said in an email that when it comes to school calendars compromise is necessary.

“As I said all along during the forums, in my 16 years of building calendars, nobody is ever completely happy with the end product. If we agree we can live with it, the job is done – move on,” he wrote.