Mineola School Board Debates 2012-13 Calendar

Mineola students will still be getting a full 182 days worth of instruction in the 2012-13 school calendar, but in order to get there they will be be brought back before Labor Day according to Superintendent Dr. Michael Nagler.

Placing a draft before the at the October 20 meeting at the , Dr. Nagler said he would be sending the trustees his suggestions along with snow days and vacation for the upcoming school year.

“It is really not possible to put in 182 days without starting in August,” he said.

The mandated number of instructional days in New York State has been 180 days, with districts gaining additional days through teacher negotiations over time. In 2012, Labor Day will fall on September 3 and the superintendent has recommended starting classes either Tuesday or Wednesday. Typically the last day of school coincides with the day of the last Regents exam, but the district could extend the year past that date as well.

“The good thing about it is if we have three days in August we can do a lot of the NWEA testing during those three days which we typically do in the first couple of weeks anyway,” Dr. Nagler said. “It may be a good time to start school, initiate kids into the building and get their testing as much of that as we can get through prior to starting after that.”

The superintendent predicted when they begin doing multi-state assessments such as the PARCC exam that the district would be starting earlier than Labor Day.

Acknowledging that not every student may make it back from summer vacation with the earlier start, Dr. Nagler said the district could test the children who don’t show up those three days at a later time as long as they test the majority of students in the district. Another option, which the superintendent suggested as “radical,” is to eliminate the February break.

The possibility to add the Wednesday before Thanksgiving as an off day was also added.

“I only added the Wednesday before Thanksgiving because I don’t want to bring (students) in for two days in a week,” Dr. Nagler said. “I’d rather bring them in for three days and that gives me a day to add.”

Board President Christine Napolitano called for an “unofficial” vote of the teachers and parents present in the audience that night of starting in August or doing away with February break, with the majority opting for the August start.

The superintendent would be submitting a more through range of possibilities to the board for adoption at a later meeting.