A shift to healthy, safe school hours would cost nothing — literally
Sitting through decades of budget hearings as the county auditor, I repeatedly heard the Anne Arundel County Public Schools administration assert its transportation services are among the most efficient in the state. If that’s true, the bar must be awfully low as the evaluation by the independent consultant hired by the Board of Education, Prismatic Services, discloses AACPS’s transportation services are anything but efficient.
Prismatic found many buses are routinely late, while others arrive more than 30 minutes before school starts. Many buses are half-empty, with some having only a handful of students, indicating “a strong efficiency concern.” And despite purchasing routing software in 2015, the report says AACPS continues to manually route buses, using the software only as a “picture display.”
Prismatic also exposes the false assertion that implementing healthy, safe school hours would cost $8 million, an estimate they report AACPS staff developed informally with no guidelines and no vetting. Maybe that’s why the AACPS administration was either unable or unwilling to provide details on the estimate to the County Council back in 2015.
When Superintendent of Schools George Arlotto included $8 million to shift start times in his proposed FY17 budget, he said, “I am not opposed to shifting school start and dismissal times. I do not argue with the science of circadian rhythms or sleep needs.”
But he then imposed four conditions, saying, “I believe very strongly that any changes we make must be instructionally sound and must not come at the expense of other parts of the educational program or our employees. Any plan must also take into account the logistical considerations that exist, especially with regard to the time it would take to acquire buses and adequately certify bus drivers and aides.” Fast forward to 2020. Prismatic reports the existing bus routes are so inefficient the Board of Education could shift elementary schools to 8 a.m. and middle and high schools to 9 a.m. at no cost — literally. Because no additional buses or drivers are needed, the shift would not come at the expense of other programs or employees.
And we’ve known for years that healthy start times are effective.
Healthy start times result in better attendance, less tardiness, improved grades, improved test scores, better graduation rates, improved physical health, improved mental health, fewer vehicle accidents, fewer sports injuries, fewer teen pregnancies and fewer risky behaviors, such as drug and alcohol use. Research also shows healthy start times can help close the achievement gap because children of color are disproportionately affected by too early start times.
Shifting school hours is an “educational and leadership decision,” as Prismatic noted. But they also wrote the American Academy of Pediatrics’ recommendation to start high school and middle school 8:30 a.m. or later “should likely be considered the final word on the subject,” and “[w]hile districts may feel it important to take the pulse of stakeholders, at some point a district should give the recommendations of experts the consideration they deserve.”
Now that Arlotto’s four conditions have been met, will he champion a shift to healthy hours next fall? Will he propose hours that ensure no child has to walk to or from the bus stop in the dark? Or will he continue to obstruct healthy, safe hours as he did in 2016 when the only option he chose to present to the community was the one least favored by parents in 2014?
The Board of Education is obligated to the taxpayers to hold Arlotto accountable for correcting the gross inefficiencies noted in Prismatic’s report.
Simultaneously, the board has the opportunity to “elevate all students and eliminate all gaps” by shifting start times to 8 a.m. for elementary schools and 9 a.m. for middle and high schools, beginning this fall and within the existing budget. Don’t the taxpayers and our children deserve as much?
Teresa Sutherland is a parent advocate for healthy, safe school hours for all children. She works as the Annapolis city manager, but the opinions in this column are her own and do not reflect the position of the administration of Mayor Gavin Buckley.