PITTSBORO — The Chatham County Board of Education heard several updates at its February meeting Monday, held at George Moses Horton Middle School’s multipurpose room, including proposed calendar changes for the 2023-2024 and 2024-2025 school years.
The changes include more teacher workdays, fewer early-release and late-start days, more balance between grading periods and an intentional focus on the North Carolina requirement of 1,025 hours of classroom instruction.
Kelly Batten, assistant superintendent for human resources, shared an overview with the board Monday after working with the District Calendar Committee. The committee devised two options for the calendars over the next two school years. Those options, A & B, were then distributed in a survey to school stakeholders including staff, parents and students.
Option A had minimal changes from this year’s school calendar. Option B used balanced instructional days for each semester and three to five additional teacher workdays. Option B was overwhelmingly more popular among the more than 770 survey respondents, Batten said.
Feedback from the survey showed respondents also desired an “early spring break” around the middle or end of March. This would ensure the break doesn’t fall near End of Grade (EOG), or Advanced Placement (AP) course testing.
Batten said CCS wanted to ensure there were more teacher workdays in upcoming years to accommodate the new state-mandated Science of Reading professional development program, known as LETRS.
In partnership with the Chatham County Board of Elections, the upcoming calendars would also schedule a teacher workday on the November general election day annually and the March primary day in even-numbered years for schools to be utilized as polling sites if needed.
No action was taken on this item. The calendars are expected to be voted on during the March meeting.
Other business
• Jaime Detzi, executive director of the Chatham Education Foundation, was publicly honored for receiving the January Power of One Award for her contributions to the district.
• Jennette Horton, CCS Exceptional Children’s instructional program facilitator, and Heather McDaniel, high school transition coordinator, were awarded the February Exceptional Children’s Awards for going above and beyond in the district’s EC program.
• Kelsie Adloo, Northwood High School media coordinator, was honored as the January Excellence and Opportunity Champion for building a media collection that supports and reflects students of all backgrounds.
• The board heard a presentation on the status of the CCS Exceptional Children’s program. EC students account for 13.75% of the district’s student population. Thirty-nine percent of EC students struggle with learning disabilities.
Sara Self-Maddox, director of the EC program, told the board the department has seen lingering challenges from COVID-19. She said many students who need support from EC did not receive early interventions due to the pandemic and now need to catch up.
There are also staffing challenges across the board with roughly 15 current vacancies in the EC department. Self-Maddox said the greatest need for the EC department right now is an increase in human capital.
• The one action item on the agenda was the approval of new door badge readers for 16 of 19 CCS schools. The door badges, which were approved unanimously by the board, will be funded through a Safer Schools Grant. The 36 total badges along with all cameras and required infrastructure have an estimated cost of $139,022.
The badge readers reduce the number of physical keys necessary for district and school staff and can help reduce the response time necessary for emergency responders.
The next scheduled Chatham County Board of Education meeting is at 5:30 p.m. on Monday, March 13, at the George Moses Horton Middle School multipurpose room. For more information visit www.chatham.k12.nc.us.
Reporter Ben Rappaport can be reached at brappaport@chathamnr.com or on Twitter @b_rappaport