The school board is finally going to be discussing middle school schedules, on March 5 after 2 pm. This is the time to come testify! If you miss this opportunity, we may not have another to contest the current schedule for years, so don't miss it! This is an email I recently got about coming out, so read it for some background info on this topic, and why you NEED to come!

"Okay, guys, I really need your help on this. The Middle School Schedule is now actually on the agenda for the next BOE meeting. In particular they will be discussing how best to offer science and social studies, but the discussion will also include the recent decisions (or lack thereof) re: the schedule (which, as you know, implicitly concerns curricular offerings as well just how these subjects are "scheduled"). Unless MANY community members show up to show they care--and that, whatever their opinions may be about science and social studies--unless many people tell the BOE that they dislike the current schedule (long periods; devoting 50% of every school day to Language Arts and Math; ABC rotation for foreign language, gym, music, and other "electives,"; no required exposure of students to art, tech ed, music, foreign language, etc.), as well as dislike the way decisions about that schedule are being made, then we lose all credibility. If we really want to see our middle schools fixed, we have to show the BOE that we actually still care enough to tell them so! Yes, I know we've told them before. But, as many of you know, this school stuff takes eternal vigilance.

Can you help by 1) testifying (you get 3 minutes to speak, or 5 if you're representing a group) and 2) getting others to testify and/or just show up at the meeting to show support? The item is on the agenda for after 2 p.m., on Wed. March 5. If you can't be there, sending letters and emails would still help, but the more people that actually go to the meeting, the better.

p.s. Here's a little background that you might find helpful or want to share with others. When Carol Parham (our Superintendent prior to Eric Smith) resigned, her last word on the middle school schedule (after some horrendous experiments involving doubling language arts at the expense of electives and an appeal to the state board of ed) was that we should have a 7-period day. We actually did have that option for one school year (2002-3), and it worked pretty well. It wasn't the ONLY way to offer kids a quality, well-rounded education (there are quite a few ways that can be done), and it had certain limitations, like letting 11-year-olds decide when and whether they would take subjects such as art or foreign language (most middle schools in this country offer some kind of quarterly or trimester rotation, which allows all kids to be exposed to subjects they might not otherwise try, while also making it possible to plan a sequential curriculum from year to year and, at the same time, simplifying scheduling and hiring practices ) But it was vastly preferable to the schedule used in 2001-2, which limited and even prevented access to electives (some of them required by the state). With a few "tweaks," we could have made that 7-period schedule work. Instead, however, Eric Smith came in and immediately announced that we were going to have a "one size fits all" school system. Since a four-period "block" schedule was already being used by a few of our middle schools, and since it was simpler and cheaper from an administrative perspective than the 7-period day, the next year found all 19 middle schools using our current schedule (with science and social studies semesterized, as they will be again next year). Dr. Smith didn't consider this schedule ideal, but he considered changing the high schools (to an 8-period block schedule) a higher priority, and always said he'd get back to the middle schools when he had time. Just before Dr. Smith resigned, he claimed that "fixing the middle school schedule" was next up on the list. But, of course, he left, and when Dr. Maxwell came in, we were back to square one. AACPS acknowledged that middle schools needed fixing, but they weren't going to do it the old top-down way. They were going to solicit community opinion and input. Thus, we had various summits and task forces over the past two school years, the only result being the decision to alternate science and social studies (this year) and, most recently, a decision to go back to the semesterized science and social studies that had people upset from the start.

Asking for a 7-period day would be one very simple way to approach this issue. I personally don't think it's the only solution. But it's far superior to the schedule we have right now, and it's something our teachers and administrators know how to do."