Magazine School District NEW CALENDAR 2018 - 2019

Table of Contents Page One Table of Contents Page Two Why should we change when we have always gone to school on this calendar? Why do we have to go year-around and shorten kids’ summer? How do these breaks help our kids and teachers? What about athletics and extracurricular events? Page Three What happens to kids that are from a split family and they spend time during the summer with the other parent? My family member is a teacher and they have to do professional development in the summer, now I will never see them. How do they get what they need and still have time for our family? We have a number of students that move into the district during the year, what happens to them? If I want my child to attend during the intersession, is that possible? Page Four What about kids that want to work during the summer? This does have to cost the district more money where is that going to come from. How will the intersessions work? Page Five What about students that take distance learning courses on-line? What happens to students that travel to UAFS for technical courses? Budget Impact Page Six What happens if we lose students? Why are we not putting these funds into other areas that can impact our students? What about childcare for some families? Page Seven What about the JAG program for our kids? What about summer camps, especially ones that a student can get scholarships or national recognition by attending? Will this affect our maintenance division by shortening their summer? How will this affect our ABC program or other grant programs? How do we currently track student achievement and what will be the indicators that the new schedule is a success? Page Eight Are we locked into this for multiple years? Added Advantages!

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Why should we change when we have always gone to school on this calendar? We could continue to use the same calendar we have always used but in today’s society we have to be willing to think outside the norms to help our students of today be prepared for the world of tomorrow. The calendar we use today was originally designed to have kids out in the summer to work on farms with their parents and today that is only true in limited cases. We always need to think of what is best for our students and their growth. Why do we have to go year-around and shorten kids summer? We aren’t going year-around and the students will still have a seven-week summer to enjoy. With this change we will simply spread the year out allowing our students and teachers to have intermittent breaks without actually adding any additional days to the calendar. Students will still attend school in nine-week intervals but they will have rejuvenation weeks built in which will allow for other educational opportunities for our students. Let’s be honest many of our students are ready to come back after seven weeks in the summer and most of their parents are ready as well. How do these breaks help our kids and teachers? Nationally kids experience what is known as “the summer slide” in many cases losing up to 40% of what they have learned during the previous year on these extended summer breaks. Research indicates that number can be reduced as much as 22% when students are not exposed to long breaks. Research also shows that students attendance and teacher attendance is better with this type of schedule. Discipline issues are reduced, graduation rates rise, and in many cases academic growth is experienced. These breaks, known as intersessions, provide students and teachers the opportunity to absorb what they have learned over the past nine weeks and for teachers to evaluate where their student’s greatest needs are for the next nine weeks. What about athletics and extracurricular events? These events, games, and practices will continue as they have in the past. During the intersession weeks if your student participates on a team or club they will continue to practice or take part in those events just as they have during holiday breaks for years. Our students are committed to what they take part in and are willing to come to practices or games/events. Schools in Colorado, Georgia, Texas, Florida, and California have used these types of schedules for years and they continue to lead the nation in academics and athletics. If a student/athletes family is going to travel then they will be excused to travel.

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What happens to kids that are from a split family and they spend time during the summer with the other parent? This was one area I spent a lot of time researching because in today’s society it is common for kids of divorce to spend several weeks in the summer at one or the other parent’s homes and in many cases they are not in the same community or state. What I discovered was it often opened new opportunities for families and gave many kids a chance to spend even more time throughout the year with parents. We will still have seven weeks in the summer but if a child must be gone for more time than that then they will be provided with a Chromebook and hot spot and will be able to go on-line through google classrooms and keep up with their work. They will also have the opportunity during the intersessions to make up the time they missed. It is our goal to do what is best for the students and provide them with every tool necessary to be successful in life. My family member is a teacher and they have to do professional development in the summer, now I will never see them. How do they get what they need and still have time for our family? Our staff wears many different “hats” and they do sacrifice time to be successful at their careers. Family time is critical and we do not want to take any of it away from anyone. Our teachers will be able to get most of their required professional development during the school year and during our intersessions. We will be offering what they need throughout the year on campus and have had conversations with our educational cooperative to work with us on campus and design programs to meet our teachers’ needs. We moved towards doing more training on-site some this past year and will increase that in order to meet the needs of our staff. We have a number of students that move into the district during the year, what happens to them? Those students that move into our district will be evaluated to determine where they are in comparison to where our students are that started with us. Those students that are on track or ahead of where we are will be able to enjoy the intersessions as if they had been here the entire time. Those students that may be behind will be required to attend during the intersession in an effort to help them catch up. Students of ours that decide to move out of the district will simply have to follow the calendar of the school they move to. In many cases that will mean the student will attend school longer than they would have if they had chosen to stay in our district. Remember our goal is to do what is best for our students and their future. If I want my child to attend during the intersession, is that possible? This calendar gives us a lot of possibilities for remediation or enrichment for our students. We are still working to design more programs for our students to be able to grow even more academically or to overcome identified deficiencies during these times. PAGE 3

What about kids that want to work during the summer? That’s great and they will still have that opportunity. Many employers understand when they are hiring students that they will be returning to school at some point. Our students will have more opportunities to work during the fall, holidays and spring with our intersessions, when other students that would be competing for the same job are still in school. This will also give them an advantage with employers knowing they will be able to utilize them more throughout the school year itself. Employers are flexible with young people working these days and understand the demands of school and a job. Our students /parents will know at least six months in advance when school will start. This does have to cost the district more money where is that going to come from. Don’t worry we are not asking for a millage increase or looking for our stakeholders to foot the bill. Yes, it will cost us more to move to this calendar but we need to realize educating our students to be competitive in today’s marketplace is becoming more and more challenging every year. We have to be willing to stay ahead of the curve and be innovative in our efforts. Our students deserve the chance to step into an interview with the confidence they have been educated as good if not better than the applicant next to them from Greenwood, Booneville, Danville, or Bentonville. If we only equate our ability to grow and advance by dollars and cents, then we will never reach our full potential as a school. Please do not misunderstand me, being fiscally responsible is paramount, just as providing our students with an exceptional education is as well. How will the intersessions work? Students that are determined to be behind or showing deficiencies in their work before the break will be encouraged to attend continuing development classes and we will send notification to the parents informing of what course or courses the student is behind in, the days they will need to attend, what teacher they will report to, and when the buses will run. Depending on the number of students we will be working with will determine the number of teachers needed. We will also allow students that are interested in pursuing additional enrichment in classes they have interest in to attend for planned and designed enrichment. We will be able to offer internships, job shadowing, and programs in soft skills education that will advance their skills in areas that employers say many graduates today are lacking. Backpack programs and our cafeteria will continue to function for both breakfast and lunch for those students in need of these services, as well as those attending our continuing development.

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What about students that take distance learning courses on-line? Our students will continue to be able to take these courses and would actually have the potential to work ahead in some of these classes during their intersessions. The new schedule will not impact these classes for them. The state legislature changed several rules in education last year by passing new laws that has given us more flexibility. What happens to students that travel to UAFS for technical courses? Our students will continue to be able to take these courses at UAFS. In discussions with the university, the courses being offered would not change so our students would still take them at the same times they do currently. The university now allows students to purchase a parking pass and drive themselves to the courses and we have a couple of our students taking advantage of that this year. We provide the bus that picks up students between Magazine and UAFS and that service would continue even through the intercessions. Budget Impact Teacher Salary & Fringe Benefits: $33,453.75 We will need a maximum of 10 teachers for Elementary and High School combined for continuing development classes during the four intersessions. Classes will run from 8:00 am until 12:00 pm and teachers will have a one-hour planning time until 1:00 pm. These classes will be Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. These will come out of our NSLA funds that are for services provided above and beyond the required 38 cores, because this is during a break period. This will not affect contracts. Bus Driver Salary & Fuel: $12,750.50 If we drive 500 miles per day (total route mileage) for 20 days that is 10,000 miles over the intersession periods. If we get 6 miles to the gallon and if cost went up to $4.00 per gallon fuel will be $6,668.00. Drivers will make $25.00 per trip or $50.00 per day, which would be $250.00 per day or $5,000.00 for the intersession transportation. This cost will be covered from our Operating Budget. With an increase of two students, we will cover this expense. Utilities: We are forecasting a 3% increase in our utilities usage, which will depend on many factors; however, we will budget for this increase. We are cautious but confident with increased monitoring and our expanded schedule times we could break even and potentially see a savings. Custodial Cost: $0.00 they are currently on a 240-day schedule. Cafeteria Cost: $0.00 this is covered through our state funded summer food program.

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What happens if we lose students? This is a possibility; however, we could see a gain in our student population. This is the biggest unknown but we have planned for it if it happens. There is a 3% cap on the number of students a district can lose to school of choice, which could equate to 16 students from our district. This could equate to a loss in funding from the state of $83,088, which we would cover from our building fund that sits at $1.2 million. We realize this could not continue for an extended duration and if we recognize this type of financial impact in the negative, we have the opportunity to make adjustments and changes to our schedule. On the other hand, we could realize an increase in our student population, which will increase our revenue from the state in two forms. One in our foundation funding and the other with growth funding. We have the potential to see gains from $5,200 to over $100,000. Why are we not putting these funds into other areas that can impact our students? This is not taking funds away from other programs that our students need. We have been very proactive in the last few years to dig even deeper to recognize our students’ needs and gaps in their educational journey. We have expanded our Response to Interventions (RTI) program, our dyslexia program (Sonday), identifying gaps in our reading and providing additional programs for that, (fundations, I-Ready, I-Station) and we have added programs on the secondary level such as the construction technology program and financial literacy. We will continue to evaluate the ever-changing needs of our students and provide the appropriate adjustments to meet those needs. What about childcare for some families? Our MOP center will remain open during intersessions, just as it does now throughout the summer months, other than the regular closings they do for holidays. We are also in process of developing two programs for this. One is a list of pre-qualified high school students that wish to earn money during their intersession breaks for childcare services and another is the potential of developing a self-sustaining type of Boys & Girls club. We have also been presented with the opportunity to work with the Booneville Boys & Girls Club. They have mentioned and interest of being open during our intersessions for our parents that wish to utilize their services.

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What about the JAG program for our kids? JAG (Jobs for American Graduates) is a program we currently have been approved for and we are working to get all of the details completed to be able to offer this program for our students that qualify. This school/work program allows students to come to school to complete credit work for graduation and then leave for a half day to pursue their continued employment. What about summer camps, especially ones that a student can get scholarships or national recognition by attending? We are proud of the accomplishments of our students and would never hold them back from an opportunity such as a National Convention or scholarship opportunity. Most of these programs are completed by the third week of July but if students or a student has opportunities presented to them for either of these, we would definitely do what is best for the student. They may have to complete course work through google classroom to return up to date with the other students. Will this affect our maintenance division by shortening their summer? It will require our maintenance director to schedule and develop his department’s projects in a concise logistical manner. We have already been in discussions to determine the flow of projects and our needs as a district. The staff in maintenance and custodial are both on 240 day contracts so we are here throughout this time anyway. We are very fortunate to have a staff that is dedicated and efficient in what they do. With proper planning, it will be a seamless transition. How will this affect our ABC program or other grant programs? We have been in on-going discussions with the ABC program leadership and they have assured us there will be no negative impact. With any grant program, we are at the mercy of the federal government to continue the funding for our programs. Those are decisions that are out of our control. However, there is a big push nationally to continue support in pre-school efforts. How do we currently track student achievement and what will be the indicators that the new schedule is a success? We use multiple measures to track achievement: ACT Aspire testing, Classroom assessments, Response to Intervention progress reports, I-Station reports, attendance, discipline, I Ready, Dyslexia program and screeners, ACT assessment. We will use these same indicators to determine progress and success of our new schedule. Doing reading test at the end of school and then when they return will show if we have affected their summer slide and how much.

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Are we locked into this for multiple years? Our goal is to give this an opportunity to work which would require three to five years of consistent data to truly determine its success. The state does not require us to “lock in” for any specific period it is at the discretion of the local Board to make that decision. Added Advantages! Another added advantage is the ability to have four parent/teacher conferences throughout the year as opposed to only two. We plan to have a parent/teacher conference the fifth week of each nine weeks. This will serve multiple purposes; it will allow our parents to know in the middle of each nine weeks where their student is academically and develop more lines of communication with our parents. It will give students an opportunity to make an impact on their grades before the nine weeks is finished and will identify students that may need to take advantage of the intersession openings to fill their gaps. Students will not be on campus the days of the parent/teacher conferences, which will be a mid-nine weeks break for them and will not require teaching staff to put in two full days in one as we do now. Students will be able to share their desires for enrichment opportunities at the beginning of each semester, which will in turn give the administration the opportunity to schedule programs for them that otherwise, might not be available for them during the current school calendar. Students, staff and their families will have opportunities to travel and spend different times of the year taking advantage of seasonal opportunities they cannot with our current calendar. In the event our district must take snow days, they can be made up during one of our intersession weeks or other days we plan not to have students on campus (p/t conferences). This change is just one-step in the growth and advancement of our school and community. Every parent, student, teacher, and community member has a stake in this school and the students that come out of it. Our mission is to provide these young people with the greatest chance of success once they leave us. Everyone fears change and there are no guarantees this will be the ultimate success but it is certain if we are not willing to embrace change and grow then we will become stagnant. Yes, this calendar has worked for decades and will continue to work for decades more but if you look at the world around us change is everywhere. We have to become innovative and empowering to allow our teachers to educate our young people so they can overcome the many obstacles they will surely face outside of Magazine, Logan County, and for some Arkansas. The young people of today are the leaders of tomorrow but with your help, we can make them the leaders of today and tomorrow. We are only limited by ourselves and our willingness to embrace change.

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