Peoria Public Schools will delay a vote on adopting a balanced calendar until more input from the community can be gathered.
At Monday night’s Board of Education meeting, the Balanced Calendar Committee presented findings from surveys given to both families and staff in the Peoria Public Schools system. The survey results showed that the traditional calendar was the clear favorite, with only 19% of respondents saying the balanced calendar was the best option for students, and only 18% said it was the best option for their family.
The results of the staff survey showed similar sentiments, with 26% of staff saying the balanced calendar was the best option for students and 21% saying it was the best for themselves or their family.
According to the Balanced Calendar Committee, on a balanced calendar, school would be in-session for 45 days beginning in mid-July with three-week breaks in the fall, winter, and spring. The school year would then conclude in early June, leaving 30 days as summer break.
Also presented in the survey was a modified calendar in which school would be in-session for 45-day intervals from early August to early June with two-week breaks in the fall, winter, and spring. With a modified calendar, summer break would be 45 days. Survey results showed more support for this option, but the administration still appears to have work to do in order to get the community to change its opinions.
Superintendent Dr. Sharon Desmoulin-Kherat pointed to the Valeska Hinton Early Childhood Education Center that has been running on a balanced calendar for eight years, as a beacon of success in the debate.
At Monday night’s meeting, Kherat called on Valeska Hinton Principal Katie Cobb, who agreed that teachers there “would not give it up for anything.”
Overall, Kherat said the goal is to find ways the district can better reach its students, and that the vote would be delayed until more input from the community can be gathered.
“We know we have this traditional calendar, and (we’re) trying to figure out ways to provide additional instruction to our kids,” said Desmoulin-Kherat. “The idea was, ‘Can we do better?’ Is there more that we can do in terms of finding more time to provide additional supports for children.”
Also at Monday night’s meeting, a motion to keep instructional coaches and interventionists from being reassigned was voted down. The motion put forward by board members Dr. Anni Reinking and Dan Walther was in response to the Peoria Federation of Teachers claiming a promise was broken when administration announced coaches and interventionists would be reassigned to teach full time.
This latest development is a critical point in a tenuous period between the union and administration, said PFT President Jeff Adkins-Dutro.
“Our relationship with the administration will be transactional because we simply cannot trust them,”said Adkins-Dutro. “This is unfortunate because it is the least fertile ground for collaboration; you cannot collaborate well with those you do not trust.”
Walther, whose bid for reelection failed in the April 6 elections, pushed for improved recruiting prior to the vote.
“I think we’re going to do more harm by taking an interventionist who will now be in a classroom affecting 20 or25 kids when in fact she...would be helping teachers and maybe 200 kids (as an interventionist),” said Walther. “In listening to the people who are interventionists and coaches (talk about) what they’ve done and what they do, I think we should be working at doing more recruiting than we’re doing to offset this.”
The motion failed by a 4-3 margin, with Chase Klaus, Reinking, and Walther voting"yes," and Lynne Costic, President Doug Shaw, Martha Ross, and Vice President Gregory Wilson voting "no."
Later in the meeting, a motion to rename Thomas Jefferson Elementary School to Rev. Dr. Cordy Tindell Vivian Elementary School was tabled due to a board policy requiring all agenda items to be signed by at least two members of the board. Vice President Gregory Wilson added the agenda item with only his signature, and the board tabled the motion at the suggestion of legal counsel. The vote to finalize the renaming is expected to take place at the next board of education meeting.
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