Changes to the school schedule may result from the recently re-negotiated contract for the Brookline Educators Union. These changes, recently agreed upon by the BEU and the School Committee, will potentially make certain school days longer and others shorter.
The new contract calls for a change in schedule to all Brookline schools, including the high school.
“There’s going to be a new way that teachers work with each other in terms of collaboration and common planning,” said guidance counselor Eric Schiff, chair of the negotiations team for the teachers’ union.
A 40-minute period will be put aside for teachers to collaborate, plan lessons, have grade level meetings and to discuss a variety of other issues, according to Schiff.
The current schedule does not put aside time for teachers to do this.
“It’s very hard for teachers to collaborate,” said Associate Dean Scott Butchart. “They have no free time together unless they work together after school, before school or during lunch, when you’re supposed to be eating lunch.”
“You would want, for the students’ benefit, to have teachers working within the same construct,” said Butchart.
Although the collaboration period will give teachers more time to prepare and work with each another, it also poses a logistical nightmare.
According to Schiff, the contract calls for four schools days to be elongated by 10 minutes and a 40-minute early release on the other school day.
Because of the block structure of the high school schedule, every student and teacher has a different schedule. Therefore, according to Schiff, an equal amount of time must be added to each block.
During negotiations for the new contract, it was the time component that met the most opposition because it posed such uncertainty for the high school’s schedule.
In order to maintain student contact time, time put aside for the collaboration period must also be somehow incorporated back.
The amount of total teaching time cannot be altered due to contractual agreements, also posing another restriction in terms of changing the schedule.
“It also affects the way people do their job. People have to be protected on both sides,” said Schiff. “The people of Brookline need to protected so that their schools are still going to be a place where high quality education is delivered and the teachers need to be protected so that they are still treated as professionals.”
Some believe that the new schedule may affect sports and other after-school extracurriculars.
“People with after-school commitments won’t be able to go home,” said sophomore Liz Whipple. “It would seem like a waste of 40 minutes.”
Senior Matt Gifford, who is a student legislator, does not see a potential schedule change as a bad idea, though students may be restless at first with a later ending time.
“I see that students are going to have a bit more learning time in school and also days to get out of school a bit earlier and relax more,” said Gifford.
Freshman Daavi Gazelle doesn’t think an additional 10 minutes at the end of the day would make a significant difference.
“Last year, we got out at 2:20 and this year we get out at 2:45,” said Gazelle, “but I don’t really feel a big difference.”
Butchart believes that in the future, the high school will inevitably move towards a longer school day.
“I think the whole country is going to be forced to move that way because there’s so much to teach kids, there’s so much to learn, that it doesn’t fit within a six-hour school day,” said Butchart.
The new contract will be implemented in the 2013-2014 school year.
Yijin Yang can be contacted at [email protected]
