Start next school year in early August? NC districts dealing with COVID may get option
North Carolina public schools could start in early August and all school employees could be paid as if they worked during the school closures caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
The closure of the state’s public schools for at least two months to try to slow the spread of COVID-19 is forcing educators and families to rethink how the rest of the school year will go.
To help ease the transition, the State Board of Education presented Thursday a wide range of items involving student testing, school calendar, teacher evaluations and employee pay that it may ask state lawmakers to change this year.
Everything is on the table, according to state Rep. Craig Horn, co-chairman of the House COVID-19 Education Working Group. But he also said at Thursday’s committee meeting that nothing has been decided yet.
“Don’t take any of these things that we’re looking at as fact, that we’re going to do this or we’re going to do that,” said Horn, a Union County Republican. “That would be wrong-headed and inappropriate for some people that are going to get worked up over this, that or the other. We’ve got a long way to go.”
Schools are switching to using remote learning to continue teaching students while they are closed through May 15. But the move away from in-person instruction is creating challenges in how students will be graded and tested and how school employees will be paid.
Freebird McKinney, director of legislative affairs for the State Board of Education, told lawmakers Thursday that a number of items are being discussed as potential waiver requests.
Schools want calendar flexibility
One option on the table, McKinney said, is to ask lawmakers to give calendar flexibility both this school year and next school year to school districts.
Under the state’s school calendar law, most public schools must start no earlier than the Monday closest to Aug. 26 and end no later than the Friday closest to June 11.
No decision has been made yet about whether schools will reopen this school year, but McKinney said they may want lawmakers to allow schools to begin the 2020-21 school year in early August. He said this “extended education plan” provision would include a sliding end date “to account for hurricanes, inclement weather, or further COVID-19 impact.”
School districts have tried for years to lobby for calendar flexibility. But the tourism industry’s lobbying has helped block school calendar bills that were passed in the House from being heard in the Senate.
The state board may also ask the legislature to waive the requirement that schools provide at least 185 days of classes or 1,025 hours of instruction each year. McKinney brought up the example of how lawmakers helped the school districts hardest hit in 2018 by Hurricane Florence to waive up to 20 days of missed classes.
McKinney also noted how after Florence, lawmakers let school employees be paid as if they had worked during the days schools were closed.
Lawmaker says school employees will be paid
School districts are worried about how they’ll pay employees, particularly hourly workers, during the extended closure. Policies have varied among individual school districts but Horn said that lawmakers want to help.
“We want our employees to rest assured that it’s the intent of the General Assembly that everybody gets paid and we’re going to find a way to make them as useful as we possibly can in the ultimate goal of delivering a quality education to every student,” Horn said.
The state board may also ask for help in how schools are evaluated by the state.
The U.S. Department of Education approved Monday the State Board of Education’s request to not give standardized tests to students to meet federal requirements.
The state board is looking at temporarily suspending the end-of-grade and end-of-course exams, the N.C. Final Exams and the K-3 diagnostic assessments requirements in the Read To Achieve program, according to McKinney.
No General Assembly action is required to cancel the state exams, according to Brian Gwyn, a legislative staff attorney. But he told lawmakers that many state laws do rely on the test data.
The state uses the exam data for things such as evaluating teachers, giving bonuses to principals and teachers and giving A-F letter grades to public schools based on their performance.
McKinney said the state board may ask that the school performance grades not be issued this school year.
Many educators dislike the A-F performance grades, which are based mainly on how many students at a school pass exams, saying it unfairly stigmatizes high-poverty schools.
Other things that McKinney said are on the table for possible waivers include:
▪ Suspend using student test data from SAS Institute’s Educator Value-Added Assessment System (EVAAS) to evaluate teacher effectiveness;
▪ Waive requirements for administrators to observe teachers;
▪ Grant licensure flexibility for teachers who are up for renewal this year or next year;
▪ Waive several requirements for student teachers.
The working group will meet again next week as it works to develop recommendations to present to the full House. The ideas being considered by the state board might get opposition.
“I just wanted to mention to the entire committee as we get together next week I think you’ll see a lot of recommendations being made against the things that were talked about today,” said Rep. John Fraley, an Iredell County Republican and committee co-chairman.
This story was originally published March 26, 2020 at 4:53 PM.
