Courtney Lomax of the Express-Times (read the article here) primarily addressed the parents' concerns and options if a strike takes place. She also includes a clear overview of what happens when a strike occurs per state law.
Arlene Martinez of the Morning Call (read the article here) primarily addressed the issue of the specials classes overcrowding in certain grades on the elementary level. She also mentioned the request to add a pool to the new building plans. It seems a group wants to put it to a referendum vote and it was uncertain if that could be placed on the ballot.
In what seems like a clear case of you had to be there to get it, Martinez writes:
The reason students are placed into larger groups — thereby allowing teachers to supervise in shifts — is because teachers were being asked to work 8 a.m. to 2:10 p.m. with a half-hour lunch.I have to assume the specials teachers were being asked to work without a break, not the classroom teachers. Teachers on the elementary level are on-site 7:30 to 3:00 p.m. with the bell starting school at 8:05 and ending the day at 2:10 p.m. This has not changed. Lunch and specials have always been offered on a five day cycle (switched this year to four and the resulting class size changes) and are an opportunity for classroom teachers to take a bathroom break, so it would be inferred that the reference was to the specials' teachers.
Teachers lacked the option to even use the bathroom besides the single break, Superintendent Victor Lesky said.
The other issue that doesn't appear to have been addressed is that classroom teachers are now teaching computer, which used to be a special. Questions posted on this site wondered what the computer teachers were teaching now. It didn't seem that this came up, but if it did, again please comment.
Were you at the meeting? What was your take? What other issues came up? What additional information can you provide?
4 comments:
You are definitely having problems accessing your site. I have tested it at both work and at home. You get a "Error 504: Gateway Timeout." if you use www.newsovercoffee.com.
I bet your hits are down and you could try accessing the site from another location (library)? Could Don Keller have sabotaged it?
The reason that you had no good coverage of the meeting is because of deadlines. That article was obviously written early. You will likely have more detailed coverage in tomorrow's paper.
In all likelihood, Courtney opted to write and file the article before the meeting and instead of leaving the meeting early to meet deadlines she probably decided to stay for the entire meeting and file a more comprehensive piece for Wednesday's paper.
I also read the article
from the Morning Call and I am not sure which teachers they are referring to. I thought this changed in the specials schedule was to allow for teaching planning. Do all teachers have same working hours 7:30 am-3pm? The specials teachers have back to back sometimes very full classes with little time to prep and clean up between them as the way it seems now.
What teachers are supervising in shifts, first I heard of that. If there are 5 rotations instead of 4 special...classes will not overly full and specials teachers would be able to handle the classroon..as it was always done.
The special schedule at the elementary level has changed for the second time in as many years. Three years ago, students had specials, M-F. These specials were P.E., Art, Library and Music, the 5th special, computers was also scheduled. Some info that most parents weren't aware of, computer special has almost always been taught by the classroom teacher with some assistance or co-teaching from the Computer teacher. So, regular classroom teachers didn't have a prep period or break on their computer special day until lunch.
Last year, the elementary schools went to a six day cycle, so the core 4 specials remained, computers also remained and there was a sixth day that teachers again had no prep or break. Now, on a four day schuedule, the classroom teacher has a prep period while the students are in one of the core 4 specials. Computers is still included, but still taught by the classroom teacher and the computer teacher is there to assist or facilitate, not to teach.
The problem is that at all Elementary schools, grade levels with more than four classes, are being divided across the board, resulting in the higher special class size numbers. As I understand it, BES and LNES are doing it at every grade level, SES only at 3 grades.
Also understand that this is does not affect just one class. By looking at the numbers of student enrollment posted on the school board agenda for this past meeting, any grade with an enrollment of more than 100 students is looking at an average class size of 25 or more and that is for EACH special area.
If it's too late to change this for this year, well so be it. What happens next year when enrollment climbs yet again? If the 4 day schedule remains in place, will we see classes with 40 kids in a special area? Is this acceptable? I hope not. I would like to see this addressed so we are not facing this dilema again. We could add computers as a special and go to a five day schedule. We could also have grade levels go to specials at different times as the elementary schools have done in the past. There is a way to make this work.
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