WILMINGTON, MA — The Wilmington School Committee approved the 2020-2021 school calendar at Wednesday night’s meeting.
Biggest change:
- In order to provide teachers with more professional collaboration time, there will be an INCREASE in the amount of early dismissals from 6 to 9. The 9 early dismissal dates for curriculum & professional development purposes include: September 1, September 30, October 21, December 9, January 27, March 3, March 31, May 5 and the last day of school. Students will go home early, but teachers will remain at the school for trainings.
- Early dismissal dates for parent-teacher conferences remain at 2 per school. Preschool conferences are December 11 and May 21. Elementary conferences are December 3 and March 18. Middle school conferences are November 19 and February 4.
- Election Day (November 3) remains a full professional development day with no school for students.
School Committee member Jay Samaha voted against the calendar, arguing the Committee was going in the wrong direction by adding more early releases. He noted they are a real struggle for working families, pointing out a family with children in 2 different schools would have 13 early dismissals, and children in 3 schools would have 15 early dismissals. As an educator, he also questioned the effectiveness of early dismissals for teachers, noting full-day professional days is the much better way to go.
Several School Committee members indicated their desire to restructure the next collective bargaining agreement with the teachers union so that an additional 2-3 full-day professional development days are added to the calendar, which would allow the amount of early dismissal days to be scaled back. But they argued that, rather than wait for the next contract negotiations, they needed to find some time under next year’s calendar for more time for teachers to collaborate and train. The original proposal called for 4 new early dismissals, so landing on 3 early dismissals was a compromise.
Other key points include:
- The first day of school for Grades 1-12 is Tuesday, September 1. Like last year, it will be an early dismissal.
- The first day of school for Kindergarten is Tuesday, September 8.
- Like last year, school will be closed the day before Thanksgiving (Wednesday, November 25). It used be an early dismissal.
- School will be closed on Good Friday (April 2).
- The last day of school is Wednesday, June 24, assuming all 5 built-in snow days are used. That day will be an early release.
A clearer version of the calendar below can be found on page 70 of this meeting packet.
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