Previous entry: 
Next entry:
We are not happy about Aug. 17 school start
How ironic that the county where parents lobbied the Legislature so hard to make school start dates later has it taken away from us, thanks to our own county school administration.
As reported today by the SunSentinel's Marc Freeman, the state Board of Education accepted the Palm Beach County School District's request for a waiver from the state's rule that school can't start earlier than two weeks before Labor Day. The district says it wants semester exams to be completed before winter break and couldn't squeeze them in with an Aug. 24 start.
I don't know why Palm Beach County can't do what the rest of the state does, or the rest of the country. Everywhere else, kids come back from winter break and take their exams, and they do as well as or even better than our kids.
I wonder if the state Board of Ed realizes they are opening a Pandora's Box with this exception. It will be interesting to see if other counties make similar requests, making the state law parents worked so hard for irrelevant.
Gretchen Day-Bryant has a son in high school and a daughter in middle school. She’s lived to tell about the struggles of juggling little kids and work...
Joy Oglesby has an infant daughter and a sister 13 years her junior, whom she babies to the now-adult...
Cindy Kent Fort Lauderdale mother of three. Her kids span in ages from teenager to 20s...
Rafael Olmeda and his wife welcomed their first son in Feb. 2009, and he's helping raise two teenage stepdaughters...
Lois Solomon lives in Boca Raton with her husband and three daughters...
Anne Vasquez is the Online Editor in charge of overseeing SunSentinel.com. She is the mother of a 5-year-old boy and a newborn daughter.
Georgia East is the parent of a five-year-old girl, who came into the world weighing 1 pound, 13 ounces...
Brittany Wallman is the mother of Creed, 13, and Lily, 6, and is married...
Chris Tiedje is the Social Media Coordinator, and father of two boys and a girl all under the age of seven.
Comments
The Paln Beach School District may have just mobilized the Save Our Summers parents against DOE.
Posted by: Jeanne Jusevic | March 17, 2009 2:56 PM
Does the state Board of Education realize what a can of worms they have opened? Don't all the other school districts want that extra time for FCAT prep? Is there any way for this to be overturned/
Posted by: c deleo | March 17, 2009 8:44 PM
Maybe if the parents of the kids that are doing so poorly were to make sure their kids were studying over the Christmas break, then the District would not have to move the first terms exams before the break. I am getting real tired of hearing parents complain about how badly their kids are doing. The schools have them for about 6 hours a day, 30 hours a week. That leaves 138 hours a week that the parent is responsible for the child’s education.
Let us see, 30 hours versus 138 hours. I wonder who is letting down the children of Palm Beach County.
Maybe if the parents, that are not actively participating in their child’s education, would become more involved, exercise more supervision and actively take charge of those 138 hours, we would not continue to see that the majority of the kids are operating at a level 1 or 2 on a 5 point scale.
How do you know if your child needs more of your attention? Easy, if your child scores a 1 or a 2 on reading, mathematics, writing or science FCAT they need YOUR attention. They need it NOW. No more excuses.
Posted by: Very Tired | March 17, 2009 9:29 PM
Do 5 school days really make that much of a difference to the middle and high school teachers for what they need to teach before taking exams? Maybe if the high schools didn't have LTMs every other week, they could finish what they need to teach before exam time in December.
Posted by: Tara | March 17, 2009 9:57 PM
If PBC School Board is ultimately concerned about the amount of prep time for FCATs, why can't the FCATs begin a week later? Our FCATs began this year on March 10. If they started 6 days later, on March 16, that would have still have given us 10 days of FCATs, with testing ending on March 27. Why do we need yet another school-day Teacher Workday, with the students beginning Spring Break on a Friday? Why do we need to begin Spring Break on yet ANOTHER work day?
Posted by: Sandi | March 18, 2009 12:32 AM