School Board meeting 9/28/2021

In addition to receiving the year-end budget report, the board 1) discussed the school calendar and provided the calendar committee some guiding principles on what to consider and 2) received a presentation about a Covid testing protocol. Timestamps for various sections are below.

Regarding the calendar: the board had a robust conversation about all issues related to the calendar, including how much to align the calendar with other neighboring districts (affects staff who live outside FCC and affects the availability of camps since those will be offered on the larger systems’ schedules), how to balance recognizing the different cultures represented in our community with burden experienced by families (particularly those with small children and in which all parents (whether single- or dual-parent households) work outside the home) when schools are closed (this was also brought up in the context of Indigenous Peoples’ Day), and when school should start. There was some discussion of the continued use of “IB approaches to learning” days to ensure the school year does not end on a Monday. These are asynchronous days (this year they fall on teacher workdays) which are counted as instructional days where students work on projects while at home. I can see the benefit of using these to ensure the year does not end on a Monday, but their use seems more burdensome for families with smaller children and in which all parents work outside the home.

Regarding Covid testing: The program has two parts. First, FCCPS would screen random samples of individuals (conditional on participation in the program) using pooled PCR testing. If a pool is positive for Covid, the individuals in that pool are then given individual confirmatory PCR tests to determine which individual(s) is positive. Second, FCCPS will be provided a steady supply of BinaxNow rapid tests to be used to test symptomatic individuals so that they can be cleared to return more quickly if they test negative. I’m glad FCCPS is looking into further mitigation measures. Testing can identify cases early and reduce the risk of transmission. Funding goes through the end of the year. The presentation did not have many specifics because FCCPS is still waiting to be matched with a vendor and we don’t know how many people will participate as the program will be voluntary (so stay tuned to your morning announcements). Some thoughts: 

• This type of testing seems more useful in the elementary and pre-K student population. The children in those schools are unvaccinated, while 90%+ of the eligible secondary students and nearly all the staff are vaccinated. 

• As a matter of curiosity, I’m interested to know the “number needed to treat” (in this case, the number of people that need to be tested) to find 1 case and how that varies by the level of community transmission, the size of the group that is tested, and the frequency of testing.

Timestamps:

• Brief history of calendar making process in FCC

• Start of the calendar presentation

• Discussion on alignment of calendars

• Short discussion of religious days (providing all staff with some leave to celebrate their various holidays was mentioned as an option to accommodate staff)

• Discussion of issues that arise when calendars do not align

• Discussion of starting and ending dates (consensus on starting 1 week prior to Labor Day with a goal of ending by June 15)

• Discussion of “IB approaches to learning” days 

• Discussion of student religious/cultural holidays 

• Recognition that if schools are open on various religious/cultural holidays, there should be more explicit rules in place to ensure holidays are respected, such as ensuring testing and other major assignments do not occur on those days and ensuring sporting or other events do not take place, for example, the night on which a holiday starts. 

• Recognition of the burden put on families and the difficulty of staffing daycare on those holidays

• Get input from the daycare committee to see what options would be available for those families that need childcare

• Discussion of having school on Indigenous Peoples’ Day

• Potentially using Veteran’s day as a teacher workday

• Discussion of school breaks (Thanksgiving, Winter break, Spring break)

• Suggestion of half-day on the Wednesday of Thanksgiving week rather than a full day off

• Two week winter break vs. 10 day winter break

• Keep spring break aligned with Easter or decouple it: having a set week of the year may be more optimal from an instructional point of view because the date would be fixed rather than floating between mid-March and mid-April

• How many years should be considered (board recommends calendar committee only consider the 2022-2023 calendar this year)

• Year end budget report

• Presentation on Covid testing program