After months of surveys, discussions and deliberations, the Dublin ISD school board approved the 2023-24 school calendar. Though the board did not approve fully moving to a 4-day week, the approved calendar is a hybrid model that will give students and teachers more days off.
When conducting the survey, the district discovered staff were in favor of 4-day weeks by 67.8% with 14.4% saying no and 17.8% being undecided.
However, students from 7th grade to seniors and parents who completed the survey, were not in favor.
With parents, 48% said they were in favor, 44.7% said no and 7.3% were undecided. With students, 42.2% said they were in favor, 46.3% were not in favor and 11.3% were undecided.
The district presented two versions of a calendar to staff members, one that was almost identical to the current calendar and one that was the hybrid. Overwhelmingly, school district employees voted for the hybrid calendar.
With the hybrid calendar, there are more four day weeks built in, but not every week.
Elementary school hours are 7:45 a.m. to 3:25 p.m. and secondary school hours are 7:45 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
The first day of school for students is Aug. 9 and the final day is May 24.
Four day weeks include:
■ the week of Aug. 21-25 with Monday, Aug. 21, 2023 off;
■ the week of Sept. 4-8 with Monday, Sept. 4, 2023 off;
■ the week of Sept. 18-22 with Monday, Sept. 18, 2023 off;
■ the week of Oct. 9-13 with Monday, Oct. 9, 2023 off;
■ the week of Oct. 30-Nov. 3, with Monday, Oct. 30 off;
■ the week of Jan. 15-19, with Monday, Jan. 15, 2024 off;
■ the week of Feb. 5-9, with Monday, Feb. 5, 2024 off;
■ the week of Feb. 19-23, with Monday, Feb. 19,
■ 2024 off.
Students and teachers will also have regular holidays including a week off for Thanksgiving from Nov. 20-24, a three week Christmas break from Dec. 18-Jan. 5, spring break from March 11-15 and an Easter break March 29 –April 1.
Graduation is set for Friday, May 24, 2024.
“There isn’t enough data to see how a continuous four day week impacts students,” School Board member Bob Cervetto said.
Assistant Superintendent Terri White also said there wasn’t enough data to see if four day weeks truly helped with teacher retention, which is the primary reason DISD considered the concept in the first place.
“They need to interact, especially coming out of COVID,” School Board member Pat Leatherwood said. “We can’t make everyone happy but this seems to be a good fit.”
The new school calendar is available on the district’s website and will also be uploaded to dublincitizen. com.
School safety was also on the minds of the school board after getting the opportunity to visit with the president of the Santa Fe, Texas school board at a recent training in Galveston.
In 2018, there was a school shooting in Santa Fe, which is outside Houston, where 10 students and teachers were killed and 13 others were wounded.
One thing that came from the training was that the district will begin to place room numbers inside the classroom in order to help law enforcement and 9-1-1 operators locate where students are.
“I can’t tell you how many times someone will tell me they are in room 103 and I will ask, whose classroom is that? I know them by who is teaching generally speaking,” Superintendent Melissa Summers said. “Kids don’t necessarily know the number of the classroom they are in and in a lockdown they can’t open the door to look. It’s the easiest solution.”
Summers also addressed a recent terrorist threat that DISD experienced. Though the threat occurred on Feb. 14, the district did not know about it until Feb. 28. Following the threat an investigation was completed by Monday, March 6 and an all call went out the following day.
“School safety is an ongoing thing and we have to keep emphasizing to our students, if you see something, say something,” Summers said. “We are doing everything we can to prevent a school shooting from happening here.”
Cervetto emphasized the need for students to realize that words matter and that threats are being taken seriously.
The district has already undergone a miniature safety audit, which they passed with flying colors, but their larger state safety audit will occur by the end of the year.
The school board also heard from Erath County Chief Appraiser Jonathan Pringle about what to potentially expect from upcoming appraisal values.
“I suspect there will be value increases again this year, but hopefully it won’t be as bad as last year,” he said.
Pringle explained that appraisal values, per the state must be within a confidence interval of 95105%. This confidence interval is typically completed every three years.
In 2021, property within DISD boundaries only reached 89.9% of the confidence interval and the appraisal district received a grace period of a year. In 2022, they had to raise appraisals in order to get the confidence interval in line and were able to get it to 95.66%.
“We raised them close to 40% in multiple areas as did much of the state of Texas,” Pringle said. “It’s a random sample of properties.”
They will be going through the confidence interval process again in 2023.
“Our starting point for DISD is better than if we were behind,” he said.
Pringle said there are several bills going through the legislature currently including one that would increase homestead exemption from $40,000 to $70,000.
Summers explained it was a balancing act because if property values increase, state allocation for school district funding would decrease.
“We aren’t sitting here saying let’s raise taxes,” Leatherwood said.