If you are not happy with this years' school calendar, now is your chance to have an input on your preferred choice for the upcoming school year. West Virginia State Code and the West Virginia Board of Education Policy 3234 are used to guide local school systems in developing an annual school calendar. When picking the calendar, there are several things to be considered based upon the codes and policies:
It must provide an instructional term of 180 separate days or the same amount of instructional time gained by increasing the minutes in a full school day for students.
There must be 200 days of employment term.
When all schools get the minimum instructional minutes per day based on their state by at least 30 minutes, (Elementary School: 315 + 30= 345 minutes, Middle School: 330+30= 360 minutes, and High School: 345+30= 375 minutes) the schools have reached sufficient instructional time to avoid rescheduling or adding days to make-up for 5 days missed due to school closings for weather or emergencies.
Approved by the WVBE, Harrison County Schools can use up to 5 non-traditional instructional days, which is a day notwithstanding the closure of school and shall be credited as such on the day instruction is delivered. Employees report on a 1 hour delay, so it counts towards their 200-day contract, while students do not report.
After 18-days of instruction, the calendar shall include 20 non-instructional days: 2 preparation days for closing and opening school, 7 legal holidays (Labor Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, MLK Jr. Birthday, and Memorial Day), 1 election day, 6 out of school environment days ( 4 have to be scheduled before the 130th day of school), can be used as make-up days except if utilizing non-traditional full days ( county boards should be aware they may use the non-traditional days prior to OS days), and lastly 4 remaining days at the county's discretion for parent teacher conferences , curriculum development, and professional meetings.
It must provide 6 two-hour segments of time for faculty senate meetings (1 prior to first instructional day and 1 at the end of the school year), and remaining faculty senate meetings can be held on days set aside for late arrivals and early dismissals, or part of a non-instructional day. The portion of the non-instructional day scheduled for the faculty senate meeting shall be considered as part of the purpose for which the non-instructional day is scheduled.
The county boards chose to add at least 30 minutes to the instructional day of every school in the district. They will be able to use the time to:
balance the time for late arrivals, early dismissals, faculty senate meetings, and school assemblies
plan 180 instructional days for up to 5 days or up to 5 days of Professional Learning with no students
utilize up to 5 days for the loss of instructional days due to weather or other emergencies
Harrison County Schools work with Doddridge and Taylor counties to create the calendar due to the United Technical Center. After the calendar has been viewed, it will be approved by the local Board of Education and submitted to the WVDE to be approved in May 2020.