Schools juggle to figure out what’s fair

By Emily Richmond

Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2007 | 7:03 a.m.

In the more than 25 years since the first of her seven children entered school, Leslie Zemp has seen every permutation of school-year calendars - the traditional nine-month schedule, year-round, split sessions and modified tracks.

And sometimes her family has faced them all at once.

Try getting an elementary school student to go to bed on time when it's a beautiful night and his older siblings are running around the back yard.

"We had a lot of sleepy children going to school during the summer," Zemp said.

She may have groused about the inconvenience, but accepted it as a fact of life in the nation's fastest-growing school district.

In May the Clark County School District announced nine schools would go year-round, triggering a public relations nightmare. A cadre of parents protested the decision, demanding proof that the decision was based on high enrollment numbers and not to allow other year-round schools to switch to the traditional schedule.

The district eventually reversed its decision on several of the schools.

To Zemp, this was a prime case of a squeaky wheel getting the grease. With her youngest child in third grade, she couldn't help but feel a bit of resentment that her kids hadn't gotten a similar reprieve.

So when she found out Clark County Schools Superintendent Walt Rulffes was setting up a study group to evaluate the policies for setting school schedules, Zemp decided to apply. She was chosen for the group, which met Monday for the first time.

"My preference is for the nine-month schools, but I know there are parents out there who love year-round," Zemp said. "I wouldn't want the district to take that option away for everyone. What I want to know is how they make those decisions and get a better understanding."

And if the district is looking to pacify parents who feel shut out of the process, the study group "is a step in the right direction," Zemp said.

Dale Erquiaga , a political and advertising strategist hired to facilitate the group's meetings, said he reviewed 118 applications before making the final selection of six parents and three community representatives. Two School Board members and two district administrators also were appointed to the study group.

Parents were fairly evenly divided in their love or hate of year-round schools, Erquiaga said. Teachers tended to be opposed to year-round schedules, while administrators were supportive. And the handful of business and community representatives "tended to be neutral," Eriquiaga said. "They wanted the data. Their opinions and lines of question tended to focus on the costs."

The study group will spend six weeks reviewing the district's policy for setting school schedules and submit a report to Rulffes.

The study group's findings will be factored in when the School Board considers revising the existing policy, President Ruth Johnson said. The district also will use the report to plan next year's bond measure, Johnson said. The district is expected to ask voters to approve an additional 10 years' worth of school construction funding. The final price tag, estimated at $10 billion to $15 billion, depends on how many schools the district decides it needs. And that depends in largely on how many campuses operate year-round.

Currently about 40 percent of the district's elementary schools are on year-round schedules and the rest follow a traditional calendar. Although the district has gone to split schedules to ease crowding at middle and high schools in the past, no secondary campuses currently operate year-round.

That's something many voters would like to see change, said Joyce Haldeman, executive director of community and government relations for the School District.

It's become a familiar refrain at community meetings, particularly those held at senior centers, Haldeman said. Not only do people think schools should operate throughout the summer , some voters want campuses to run three shifts - morning, noon and night.

"This is a 24-hour town and they believe schools should operate on the same schedule," Haldeman said.

In fact, the School Board pledged to have all elementary schools run year-round when the last bond measure was approved in 1998, Haldeman said. But with construction costs soaring, the district realized it could save money in the long run by building more schools quickly using prototype designs. As a result, by next year the district will have built 101 new schools, 13 more than promised in the capital plan.

With the accelerated construction , some schools open closer together, eliminating the need for year-round schedules, at least in the short term. But the long-term pledge was always to have elementary schools run year-round, Haldeman said.

"The decisions for school calendars have not been driven by anything but economic factors," Haldeman said.

But even if the district had the financial freedom to adopt any schedule it wanted, year-round schools would likely be part of the mix, she said.

"There are people who believe it is academically superior, that their children do better on it and believe it's a better way to deliver education," Haldeman said.