Newtown Middle School has a new “master schedule” approved for the 2021-22 school year.

NMS Principal Thomas Einhorn presented the new master schedule with Assistant Superintendent of Schools Anne Uberti at the January 5 Board of Education virtual meeting.

“We decided that looking at our current schedule, that while it is a great schedule, that it didn’t always provide us with the things that we needed to have our schedule to do,” said Einhorn.

The new schedule was created from a process that involved committee work, input from multiple areas of the school community, priorities, drafts, and more. The committee began working in September.

Einhorn said the committee looked at other middle school schedules and surveyed educators.

“In the end we looked at and created over 17 different schedules,” he shared, “and then looking at all those schedules we came to a point where we feel the one we have right now that we are proposing best meets our individual needs for us here in Newtown.”

According to a slide from the presentation, the current schedule allots for 314 instructional minutes daily and the new schedule would allow for 329, due to removing “learning lab” time. The new schedule also dedicates a math interventionist and a reading interventionist at each grade level along with a special education teacher to support every cluster.

The new schedule will have five cluster teachers, instead of the current four, by adding a world language instructor to each cluster. The model is expected to support the district’s Spanish curriculum. Once every 12 days, students will have the opportunity to work with their peers in a music ensemble, so all students taking a music program would be able to meet together.

Other changes include the discontinuation of the school’s Family and Consumer Science class; there will be increased instructional time for health, technology education, and computer integration classes; and a cooking club will also be offered for students interested in culinary.

“There are some staffing implications here,” Einhorn said.

The presentation highlighted a total reduction of nine positions while adding 8.2 positions.

“This is the great overview of everything,” Board of Education Chair Michelle Embree Ku said of the presentation, noting that the board’s curriculum and instruction subcommittee spent a “great deal of time” going over everything... I appreciate all the work that went into this.”

The Board of Education unanimously approved the new schedule after discussion, during which Board of Education Vice Chair Dan Delia said he supports the additional 15 minutes of daily instruction.

“We spent two lengthy sessions on this schedule,” board member John Vouros said, as a member of the curriculum and instruction subcommittee, “and there’s no question that I personally endorse it. It is very thorough, extremely well thought out, and, in the end, benefits the children immensely.”