The calendar proposal that the Palo Alto Board of Education will vote on at tonight’s meeting does not include moving finals to before winter break because of concerns about moving the first day of school, according to Triona Gogarty, Palo Alto Educators Association president.

“The decision [to not move finals in the new calendar proposal] was researched in several ways,” Gogarty said. “We [the calendar committee, including PAEA, California School Employees Association and the district]looked for studies indicating a benefit to students in placement of finals either before or after the break. We could find no studies indicating any benefit or detriment.”

Suzanne Antink, a Paly math teacher, served on the calendar committee two years ago, and is a proponent of moving the first day of school to an earlier date to accommodate the relocation of finals to before winter break.

The previous calendar committee supported moving finals to before winter break for educational reasons. One of these reasons was that the month following tests such as the AP exams and STAR tests, would not be spent on in-class projects but instead be spend preparing for the these tests, according to Antink.

“By moving that month of time in class, you could use that time to really absorb, maybe even lessen the pace a little,” Antink said. “And in this way, it could really benefit AP classes and it would lessen student stress.”

Gogarty cited many reasons for why the first day of school was not moved to earlier in August to accommodate finals before winter break.

Most of the elementary schools do not have air conditioning making early August starts rather uncomfortable for the younger kids,” Gogarty said. “The board has heard from the parent community about cutting into the August vacation. Parent opinion has been running against moving the school year so that it starts in mid to early August to allow for end of semester before winter break.”

Antink has her own ideas on how to improve the school calendar.

“Ideally, I think we should start in early or mid-August and end at the end of May,” Antink said. “It’s an issue for semester classes. But I think it’s okay to have a bit of unbalance because of testing during the second semester. There is no reason for us to support everyone going on vacation in August. ”

The calendar committee two years ago held town meetings to discuss the issue of moving the end of the semester.

“At the town meetings, there were a bunch of elementary school parents against the idea,” Math Department Instructional Supervisor, and previous committee member Radu Toma said. “At the last moment, both the district and the union said that it wasn’t workable and our effort basically fell through. The calendar for the last two years was a collaboration between the district and the union.”

Teachers who teach semester classes would be impacted by the addition of more time to the first semester because of the difference in the number of class periods.

“I would not be opposed to it [finals before break], but I would want to consider the impact for semester and year long courses,” said Hillary McDaniel, Paly social studies teacher. “It all depends on how you balance out the days.”

According to Assistant Superintendent Scott Bowers, when Palo Alto Educators Association (PAEA), California School Employees Association (CSEA) and the district created the current proposal, they incorporated input from e-mails.

This year, the public was invited to view the calendar proposal and send input to the school board by e-mailing [email protected].

According to Bowers, for every person that supported having finals before break, there were seven who wanted to keep the start date of Aug. 25 or later. Thirty e-mails regarding the location of finals on the calendar did not mention the start date.

“I support it [moving finals to before break] 100 percent,” said Antink. “Some students will be studying, and others will feel like they should be studying and it just builds student stress.”

In order to help lessen student stress, the proposal includes the statement: “There should be no expectations on the part of students or staff that schoolwork is done over this period. No assignments should be given over the winter break, and any long-term assignments given before winter break should not be due during the first week back from the break.”

Bowers compiled the concerns listed in the 208 e-mails he has received as of Oct. 12, and concluded that there is strong support for having an assignment-free winter break.

According to Bowers, 127 of the e-mails he received were in support of having an assignment-free winter break, and eight e-mails wanted to make the proposed rule an official policy. Only two e-mails cited opposition to the proposal.

In the current calendar, dead week, the week before finals that is devoted to reviewing for examinations, is the week students return from winter break.

“With the semester ending the way it does now, there was a question of dead week’s location,” Bowers said. “And it almost required students to study over break. By moving dead week back, there is less obligation to study.”

Antink believes that moving finals before winter break is a solution to the problem of student stress.

“Why don’t we just try it [having finals before break] for two years like we did ski week?” Antink said. “If it turns out it was awful, then you wouldn’t hear about it again. There were no educational reasons for ski week, but we have good educational reasons for this idea [moving finals before break].”

Bowers presented e-mail input to the school board during the meeting on Oct. 14.

To view the Board document and the proposed calendars, go to http://news.pausd.org/enclosures/ProposedSchoolCalendars.pdf.

The school board will vote on the new calendar proposal for the 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 school years on Tuesday, Oct. 28.