The 2007-2008 Calendar

We've removed all draft calendars from the web site since they were focused on the 2006-2007 school year. That year's calendar was fixed at last month's School Board meeting.

But the Board began considering the 2007-2008 school year at last night's working session. They gave guidance to Dr. David Heath, WCS deputy director and member of the WCS calendar committee. Just as we suspected, "calendar creep" has apparently begun. The start date discussed last night was Aug. 13, 2007, two days earlier than the present year and one day earlier than the 06-07 year. As we've said before, beware the trend of slicing down the summer, one day at a time.

For a reason we've not yet discerned, there was discussion last night about making the fall break a full week. This was out of left field. Our position is unchanged, as stated in our core principles:

3. We believe that the school year should begin as late in the summer as possible to meet the requirements mandated by the state. The calendar's main priority should be to maximize the number of intact, contiguous weeks of classroom instruction per term. Teachers have told us time after time that maximizing the number of complete, five-day weeks of instruction is the best way to improve students' performance. Therefore, once students report for classes at the beginning of the year, non-class days should be held to an absolute minimum.

The present tradition of going to class only the first two days of Thanksgiving week will almost certainly remain intact on the WCS calendar, as it does on our own proposal.

Once again, we have constructed a proposal for the fall of 2007.

We mirrored the present school year as closely as possible. The first class day is Wednesday, Aug. 15; the first semester ends Dec. 20. WCS Director Rebecca Sharber told one of our members today that the habit of always starting on a Monday (no matter how early it pushes the start date) is not a request from her office.

Non-class days are noted on the calendar, so take a look!