With CHS being in week 10 of the school year, students have already had 2 days off, leaving students wondering why. Everyone, including teachers, had Monday, October 16th, off, and students had Wednesday, November 1st, off while teachers still had to come in. Most people are wondering why we have these extra days off.
“We reduced half days, which we don’t get at the high school level. We don’t think much about that because most students transport, or all the above becomes more problematic for some of our families at the younger levels, where students don’t transport themselves.” Angel said.
Chelsea principal Dr. Angel explains that half days can be problematic for families with younger children and can mess up schedules as far as transportation goes. By getting rid of the half days and creating all full days off, it could potentially help some families with what to do for that day.
During the 23–24 school year, there will no longer be half days. The days last year where we had half days will now be full days off, except on exam days. For exam days, we will have two full days and will start off the first exam day with the 2nd and 4th hours, with all of the other classes in between. Then the second day will just be 1st, 3rd, and 5th, with no other classes in between.
“So we had a lot of half days. Previously, we got rid of all of our half days and went to standalone full days, so you don’t have any half days off like you would have had for final exams and so forth for teacher PD.” Angel said.
On these full days off, the teachers will still be at school working. They have to work so many hours to fulfill their professional learning days. These are called PD days for teachers, where they still have to come in and help teachers.
“We have three full days this year, which is professional learning for our teachers. We have to provide what’s called district professional development, which would be like teachers teaching teachers. So that falls under three days. We have to do 30 hours of that. So we do a little bit before school and then three, seven-hour days throughout the year.” Angel said. “So that’s what you would have for November 1. There’s a day in January and a day in April. So those are three full days off for students, not for staff.”
