UPDATED: Framingham School Committee Votes on 2015-16 Calendar; Makes No Decision on 2014-15 Snow Days

The Framingham School Committee voted 6-1 to approve the 2015-16 Framingham Public Schools calendar, at its meeting Tuesday night. The vote came after 9:30 p.m., as snow and ice were coating Framingham roads.

The Committee voted the 2015-16 calendar through its 185th school day, but made no decision on how to handle snow days if the district went beyond five next year. The school district has had seven snow days thus far this year. That decision, on how to deal with snow days, will be made at the School Committee’s Tuesday, March 17 meeting.

Also the School Committee took no action on how to make up its snow days beyond the five voted into the 2014-15 (this school year) calendar.

Administration issued a snow day survey on Friday - and again last night at 6 p.m.

Framingham Superintendent of Schools Stacy Scott said that parents, students and staff have until Friday to complete that survey to give district input on how it could make up snow days.

Presently, the 185th day of school is Wednesday, June 24.

On Friday, a press released issued after 3:30 p.m. indicated the administration wanted to make up snow day six and seven during April vacation, but by 6 p.m. the administration had backpedaled and said it had made no decision on snow days yet.

Last night, during the Framingham School Committee meeting, Scott said he is learning towards making up snow days six and seven on Thursday, June 25 and June 26.

Any decision requires a School Committee vote.

Last year, the 7-member Framingham School Committee voted it “may” use April vacation days to make up snow days if the school district exceeded five snow days. There has been confusion on that vote as some have interpreted the vote as the School Committee “will” use April vacation days if the district exceeded five snow days.

That same discussion between “may” and “will” was discussed last night for the 2015-16 calendar, but a decision was delayed until March 17 on the snow day portion of the calendar.

Scott gave the School Committee a preview of the “snow day” survey results thus far.

He said more than 1,500 individuals had taken the survey since Friday evening.

He said about 650 survey takers were staff, more than 900 were parents, and another 150 were students.

Scott said while 48 percent of the survey users were in favor of giving up Good Friday (April 3) for a snow day, he said he had “difficulty” recommending that as he has heard from several “pastors” in the community.

In regards to using April vacation days to make up snow days or extending the calendar in June, he said survey respondents were split at 23 percent each.

School Committee member Don Taggart said that just means “everyone will be heard” with the survey but that “everyone will not be satisfied” with the vote.

“No matter what we decide 50 percent will be upset they did not get their way,” said Taggart, who was the lone vote in not approving the 2015-16 School Calendar last night.

Scott said one of the survey questions discussed having school in the future on Good Friday and with that question 78 percent of the survey users were in favor of that, thus far,

Scott said having school on Good Friday would be “tricky.”

School Committee Andy Limeri, who will be leaving the Committee on April 7, said the Committee has two policies on not having school on Good Friday and if administration was to recommend school on that day, the Committee would have to vote to waive its policy.

After giving a sneak peak of the ”snow day’ survey results, thus far, Scott said he was leaning towards recommending the district use Thursday, June 25 and Friday, June 26 as snow days six and seven.

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In regards to the 2015-16 school calendar, the vote by the School Committee means:

• The proposed first day of school is targeted at Wednesday, Aug. 26 for students in grades 1-12.
  
• Freshman at the high school would start on Tuesday, Aug. 25.
  
• Kindergarteners would start on Aug. 27 and preschoolers on Aug. 31.

Labor day is late in 2015 and is not until Monday, Sept. 7.

The proposed 185th day of school is scheduled on June 22. If there are no snow days, students would get out of school on the 180th day.

The calendar still has six early release Thursdays for parent conferences, however they are spread out over four months instead of concentrated over two months (October and April) in 2014-15.

One change from a previously released calendar is there will be no school on Tuesday, March 1. Teachers and staff will have school, but it was recommended that school be closed to students for the presidential primary. It will now be a professional development day for staff.