Naperville School District 203 may revamp student schedules by making such changes as adding 15 minutes to the elementary school day, increasing middle school math instructional time and shifting to a block schedule for middle and high schools.
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The changes being considered are based on student and staff feedback to allow for more project-based learning, more flexibility and personalization, additional opportunities for staff collaboration and maximization of instruction time, district officials said.
District 203 School Board members were briefed at their meeting Tuesday on the proposal. Design teams made up of teachers, support staff and administrators began meeting last spring to do research, analyze neighboring school districts and develop recommendations on the best ways to support academic, social-emotional and behavioral development of students.
The changes are “to ensure that our students time in school is purposeful, engaging and align with their developmental and academic needs,” Superintendent Dan Bridges said at this past week’s meeting.
District administration said there are some problems with the current schedule they would like to resolve.
District 203 has fewer middle school math minutes compared to peer districts while elementary schools have fewer instructional minutes and high schools have more when compared to other districts, administrators said.
The order of school start and end times also varies, with District 203 being the only area district where high school is the first grade level to start in the morning and the last to end while elementary school is the last to start their day and the first to end.
Officials also want to address supervision challenges since high school students are dropped off as early as 6:45 a.m. for a 7:45 a.m. start time and middle school students are dropped off about a half hour before the start of school.
“Every single thing we are doing is grounded in student improvement,” said Jayne Willard, assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction.
Among some of the changes the district is considering include adding 15 minutes to the elementary day, shifting middle schools and high schools to later start times to address physiological needs of teens, and shifting the schedule so that elementary students start their days first and middle school students start last.
“Research tells us that later start time improves sleep, alertness and overall well being for teens,” Bridges said.
These shifts would try to ensure that students arrive to school as close to the start time as possible and that no school day would begin before 7:30 a.m. or end later than 4 p.m., he said.
One of the key changes to the early childhood plan would be to offer a morning session for 3-year-olds for two hours instead of 2½ hours and have 4- and 5-year-old students attend in the afternoon. Currently all students attend for 2½ hours in a classroom for 3- to 5-year-olds.
The proposed preschool changes allow for more tailored instruction to students’ developmental stages and provide more planning and collaboration time for staff, officials said.
Extending the elementary school day allows for more time for individualized interventions, more social-emotional learning, and more collaboration within the school and across the district, the proposal states.
At the middle school level, students now have nine 41-minute periods each day, with 82 minutes dedicated for language arts and 41 minutes for math.
The proposal would implement a modified block schedule where math time increases to about 53 to 60 minutes a day followed by a “What I Need” course, which would allow students to receive additional support. Wednesday would be an “anchor day” during which students would attend all of their classes and have an advisory period, according to the sample middle school schedule.
The recommended high school schedule also implements the block schedule model with an anchor day that is designed to maximize instructional time, provide more opportunities for deeper learning and decrease unstructured time, the proposal states.
High school students’ days would be reduced from 7 hours and 25 minutes to 6 hours and 50 minutes but the instructional time would be similar to what they’re currently receiving, with reduced periods of time between classes and less time for such tasks as taking attendance and starting and ending classes, officials said.
“While we believe these proposed schedule shifts and instructional changes will benefit all students, we are particularly excited about the positive impact for students requiring additional supports for special education services,” Bridges said.
“These changes provide greater opportunities for individualized learning without compromising instructional time or students’ access to career exploration experiences.”
Administrators plan to continue the schedule discussion at the board’s Feb. 3 meeting. A vote on changes will be taken at a later date.
Board member Charles Cush said he would like to hear from staff about the practical implementation of the schedule. He also is interested in hearing the impact on the different student populations, he said. For example, how does it impact high school students in Advanced Placement courses, he said.
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He said he’d like to know what growing pains the district might experience and how the district will measure what is working and what isn’t.
“I am very much bought into the why around this,” Cush said. “We need to prepare our students for success in their future, not our past. I think that is a profound way of looking at it because the world is different. It is changing; it is changing really fast, and we would not be doing our jobs the best we could if we weren’t trying to anticipate what the kids are going to need, not necessarily what we had. Because what was successful in the past is not necessarily going to be successful in the future.”
Board President Kristine Gericke said the changes are coming from students and staff.
“I find that seems to be a tradition in our district,” she said. “We are listening to what our students are telling us.”
Michelle Mullins is a freelance reporter for the Naperville Sun.