Fountain Lake district weighing new calendar

FOUNTAIN LAKE — Just weeks after the Hot Springs School District hosted a family/community forum about switching to an alternative school- year calendar, the Fountain Lake School District has announced plans to host a forum of its own at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in Sargo Auditorium.

Fountain Lake Superintendent Michael Murphy said Tuesday that the intention behind the meeting is to consider different options that will help minimize student learning loss.

“We have worked internally with our teachers and surveyed them. I’ve had some atlength discussions this fall with the Board of Education, and at this point in time, we, at a governance-structure level, do not plan to entertain a shortened number of instructional days on the year,” he said.

The Cutter Morning Star School District implemented a four-day school week option this year. By lengthening each school day, it was able to remain on a traditional format with 143 instructional days compared to 178. Murphy said the Fountain Lake district is not looking to do that.

“What we’re looking at is either keeping a traditional format of a calendar with a constraint, legislatively, on when we can start school, or looking at a concept of a yearround calendar to minimize learning loss,” he said. “And so we have created some 178-day, year-round calendars that we would convey to the general public — kind of the pros and cons of each of those.”

While one of those options would include a fourday week, the total number of days would remain the same to keep each school day the same length.

“Each calendar has a onemonth-off time frame in the summer, where Hot Springs is looking more at six or seven weeks off in the summer,” he said.

Hot Springs School Superintendent Stephanie Nehus said Tuesday that the district continues exploring the option of adopting a modified/yearround school calendar.

“We are currently surveying our staff, parents, and students. Once we have received feedback provided through the surveys, we can make a more informed decision about whether to move forward with this as an option for our Trojan community. The survey has been distributed online and is being sent home in print form. We appreciate the input of everyone as we consider this change for the future,” she said.

Arkansas law allows for a traditional, year-round, fourday or instructional hoursbased school year calendar. At the Hot Springs district’s forum on Nov. 10, Nehus also cited combating learning loss as a goal.

Murphy said he believes the options Hot Springs is considering are an “easier sell” with six or seven weeks still off in the summer, while Fountain Lake is looking more at one-month summer break. By switching to a hybrid-style calendar, though, schools are not held to a requirement, which goes into effect next fall, that the school year start no earlier than two weeks before Labor Day.

Following the meeting, the district will send out an electronic survey to all parents, which will then be presented at the Dec. 12 board meeting along with the teacher survey results.