THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, February 21, 1996 TAG: 9602200098
SECTION: ISLE OF WIGHT CITIZEN PAGE: 03 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LINDA MCNATT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ISLE OF WIGHT LENGTH: Medium: 57 lines
County public school students, thanks to a few extra minutes they attend school each day, had only two snow days to make up - until Friday.
The season's third winter storm hit that day, and schools closed again.
Complicating things further was Carrollton Elementary, which lost an additional day when a tanker truck overturned near the school last month. With Friday's snowstorm, those students have four days to make up.
As of early this week, this is the plan to make up the county's snow days:
Two days will be made up Memorial Day, May 27, and June 13, extending the school year by one day. The public schools originally were due to be dismissed for summer vacation June 12.
If School Board members agree, students will make up the third day by attending school for one extra hour a day on March 5, 6, 7, 12, 13 and 14.
In fact, that was the proposal, by Assistant Superintendent Alexander Decker, that the board approved to deal with Carrollton's extra make-up day. A decision on how to make up that school's fourth day probably will be decided at the board's next regular meeting, in March. Decker said early this week that board members would be polled for a consensus on using this approach for the other schools.
During this extra hour, Decker said, K-8 grades will focus on academic review for the Iowa Basic Skills testing, scheduled to begin March 18. In grades 9-12, 15 minutes will be added to each of the school day's four periods.
The schools potentially faced making up 10 days missed in January and February because of ice and snow on county roads. But the extra minutes, technically referred to by the State Department of Education as ``bank time,'' came in handy.
``Excess time, or bank time, is calculated for the school division for a 180-day school year using the schedule for the schools with the shortest instructional day,'' Decker said in a memo to the superintendent and the School Board last week. ``This results in bank time, or built-in snow make-up time, of approximately five days.''
Thus, the bank time and shortening one early dismissal day by 45 minutes left only two days to make up.
Until Friday. ILLUSTRATION: MAKE-UP DAYS
The latest plan to make up snow days for public schools:
Two make-up days: Memorial Day, May 27, and June 13, extending
the school year by one day.
Third day to be made up by extending school day one hour on these
dates: March 5, 6, 7, 12, 13 and 14.
Carrollton Elementary has a fourth day to be made up; a decision
on that likely will be made in March.
by CNB