BOE: February Break Still In Question

By Eliza Hallabeck

While no decision was made during the Board of Education’s meeting on Tuesday, September 6, to alter this school year’s February break in the wake of losing four school days due to Tropical Storm Irene, the board set plans to deliberate the topic again at its next scheduled meeting.

Superintendent of Schools Janet Robinson said while the school calendar policy has lost days made up at the end of the school year in June, with any further lost days made up by adding days back in the calendar’s April vacation, she asked the board to consider where it would like to add the four days back in — either at the end of the year, during the calendar’s April break, or during the calendar’s February break.

The average school year has four days lost due to snow cancellations, with the 2010-11 academic year an exception to that average.

Dr Robinson also pointed out that deciding to remove the February break now would give families time to alter any plans that have already been made for that week. The scheduled February break has no school the week of February 20–24, which includes an observation of Presidents’ Day on the Monday of that week.

Multiple options were considered by the board during discussion of the topic. While Board Secretary Andrew Buzzi suggested adding three days of school back to the proposed February break, board member David Nanavaty said he would prefer to leave a four-day weekend in place of the weeklong vacation.

School Board Vice Chair Debbie Leidlein voiced concern over the fact the school board did publish the calendar with the practice of adding school days to the end of June, then to the April break, printed on it.

“I think that we really need to consider the fact that we have a stated policy with regard to this calendar that’s stated on this published calendar,” Ms Leidlein said, “and I think we need to take that seriously.”

She also noted people could have made plans for the February break assuming it will be the only vacation in the calendar that would be unaffected by snow days.

“I’m concerned,” Dr Robinson said, “because we haven’t started snow season yet and we are already four days in the deficit.”

If February break is canceled, Board of Education Chair William Hart said, it needs to be done in advance to give families warning.

“I really do believe that we should stick with our policy,” Mr Hart said. “On the other hand, this is extraordinary, and I am very nervous about this winter based on our experience last winter.”

If snow days hit the district in January or February, Mr Hart pointed out, adding school days back to the calendar in the February break will not be an option.

Mr Buzzi said the policy was written with snow cancellations in mind. While he said he supported the February break in the calendar when the board added it last school year, he also said a long weekend in February rather than a week vacation is better than having students attending school in late June.

Last year the school district had a long weekend in February, and next year the school district will not have a weeklong break as it moves toward conforming to a regional calendar with the Danbury area, as school board member Richard Gaines noted.

Mr Gaines also suggested adding some school days in February and some days in June to split the difference.

After discussing the topic and the different options facing the board, the decision was made to postpone the topic until the board’s next scheduled meeting on September 20.