Adjusting School Calendars for Snow Closure

To: All Principals

From: Tom Lord, Interim Superintendent for Catholic Schools

Re: Guidelines for Adjusting School Calendars after Recent Snow Closure

We all recognize the challenge to revising the school calendar at any time after it has been submitted and distributed to your community. We also recognize that no adjustment is going to satisfy the needs and/or desires of all of our school communities. Any plan must retain some flexibility knowing that bad weather could visit us in the following months, creating a need for further adjustments.

Parents enroll their children in our schools and have a contract with us for a full year’s instruction. It is in the best interest of our schools to recognize that each hour of instruction should be respected as necessary for us to maintain our reputation as institutions presenting a quality education.

You have received the message from OSPI, “There is no waiver available to approved private schools due to weather emergencies. You still have to maintain your instructional hours, but how you configure the rest of your school year (adding extra days at the end reducing spring break, etc.) is up to you to decide.” There is no waiver, as was available to several counties, because in public school law states, if there is a state of emergency declared, a waiver to the number of school days required is available to districts within that county. It doesn’t mean that we are not covered because we are private schools, it just means that it isn’t addressed for private schools.

That means that you may make adjustments to your schedule by means that fit your community. Your plan may include a combination of adding days, minutes, hours, canceling early release times, etc. until you have regained compliance reflecting at least a 1000 hours of contact time for students in grades one through twelve.

As you consider your school’s plan to make up for the student contact time lost due to last week’s snow incident, not participating in the March 23^rd teacher in-service day is not an option. The Archdiocesan Professional Development Days are intended to secure thoughtful engagement for our 73 schools. Teacher Excellence Day and the Deanery Curriculum Day are not an acceptable option to trim out of a school’s calendar. There has been extensive planning for in-service programs already scheduled for that day. If you believe that there are significant reasons that this decision should not apply to your school, please consult with the assistant superintendent who serves your deanery.

Within the next couple of weeks I will be requesting that each school submit their plan on how they intend to make up those lost days. Hopefully this information will give you some direction, but in the end, all schools must meet or exceed state requirements.