Board member favors block format over current seven-period day
By Jennifer Eisenbart
Staff Writer
As Monday’s Burlington Area School District School Board meeting was beginning to wrap up, board member Roger Koldeway dropped a statistical analysis into everyone’s lap.
The study, which is part of a larger spreadsheet he put together, shows a drop in students per class in elective areas such as music and art.
“The seven-class schedule has dropped enrollment in a lot of career-type classes,” said Koldeway, who added that everyone he spoke to was unanimous in their dislike of a seven-period day, vs. the former block scheduling.
When asked, though, how many people he’d spoken to, Koldeway said only about 10-15.
Rather than take the matter up for discussion at the board meeting – where it was not on the agenda – Board President David Thompson asked to send the information to the Curriculum Committee.
BASD Superintendent Peter Smet said Tuesday that the item may not appear on an agenda for the Curriculum Committee until March.
“No one is proposing any change for next year,” said Smet, who also added that he hadn’t had time to go through the entire set of figures from Koldeway.
Smet also said that there are differences in opinion on what schedule will work best, and also what schedule best fits the district’s needs.
“The block schedule had a lot of good points to it,” Smet said. “There are pros and cons to each schedule.”
-
-
-
-
-
1. When approaching something this major, it shouldn’t be done as people are packing up to go home. 2. If he said he surveyed “10-15”, it probably means “5-10”. 3. Anything this large (and changing every schedule IS a large operation), should have been discussed, then those most involved (teachers, guidance, parents and students) should be properly surveyed. Pros and cons must be discussed. Nothing I read here makes me confident that he didn’t just talk to his biased point of view friends. The sooner we get him off the board, the better.
It’s nice to see Roger Koldeway taking initiative and re-addressing poor decisions from the past with a fresh perspective. It will be great to have a Mr. Koldeway’s better half and Ms. Miller on the board to help him bring positive change to Burlington!