Mercer Island superintendent Dr. Gary Plano says there are no fatal flaws to kill the school district’s initiative of introducing world languages in elementary schools.
The question is what are those within the district willing to give up for it to happen.
Plano presented the Mercer Island School Board with several scenarios for board members to weigh over as they decide how to move forward on the elementary world languages initiative at its regular meeting Thursday, Sept. 24.
“This still looks very feasible, it looks like this can work,” Plano said. “It can work, even with a number of scenarios if the board should choose to move [school] start times.”
Plano and MISD assistant superintendent of learning Fred Rundle worked on creating drafts of a master schedule fitting a Spanish Language Program (SLP) into the elementary calendar. The program would consist of approximately 80 minutes per week, divided into three classes. It would be oral instruction, not written, and no homework would be assigned.
Plano said district administrators don’t anticipate any lost instructional time from the subject areas of math, reading or science. Planning time would actually increase for teachers from 30 minutes daily to 40 or 45 minutes. Plano said the ability to get more minutes of foreign language during the school day might be had by looking into scenarios where students have language as a separate classroom experience, possibly building language into PE and music.
The instructional day would need to be lengthened by 20 minutes, but the total length of the teacher workday, 7.5 hours, would remain the same.
Bell times of course would need to be altered if the district chooses to adopt the SLP, and Plano presented the board with three scenarios to make it work: 1) Begin elementary schools at 9:10 and end at 3:50, keep the same schedule at the middle school and start school later at the high school, potentially at 8:30. 2) Have staggered elementary start times at 8:40 and 8:50, ending at 3:20 and 3:30, with no schedule changes at the other levels. 3) Begin elementary schools at 8:20 and end at 3:00, start middle school at 9:10 and end at 3:35, and begin high school at 8:40 and end at 3:40.
But there are plenty of voices already dissenting to such schedule changes, and not just those from the clamorous band crowd. Athletics and other extracurricular groups would also be impacted. During public comments, MIHS senior drill officer Gilda Afifi made an impassioned case for keeping the high school’s drill program intact amidst schedule changes.
The drill team competes with other teams for gym space, so it is afforded time during 7th period to practice, Afifi said. If that practice time is lost, team members will have to choose between drill and their other commitments.
“This team is my family, and I know if our practice time during 7th period is taken away, our team will slowly start to collapse,” she said through tears. “What’s a fun, memorable high school without a solid spirit group?”
Board member Adair Dingle, an advocate for later start times and elementary world languages, said she appreciated feedback about the impacts later start times would have on the music program. She called elementary world language exposure “critical” to students, and mentioned the national research supporting the positive effect of later school times on adolescents.
“It is a change, but I believe it can go forward,” she said of changing start times, mentioning the district’s last change of bell times. “Eleven years ago, it was a bigger change and it worked out.”
Board President Brian Emanuels reminded those attending Thursday’s meeting that there would be several more meetings and opportunities for public input before a decision on the initiatives would be made.
