11/23/98
Opelika * Auburn News* THE NEWSPAPER OF EAST ALABAMA*11/23/98
Decision should be a democratic one
My family and I moved to Auburn nine years ago and w e have enjoyed living here very much. Our two girls, the oldest a senior at Auburn High School and her sister a student at Dean Road Elementary, have grown up in the Auburn School System. My wife and I have thoroughly enjoyed working here and we have made many lifelong friends. It has always been our dream to live and retire in a community where we can be proud to say it is our home. I am afraid the prospect of an alternative school year may affect those dreams.
I have attended several of the School Board meetings as well as the public forums held at Auburn High School and Dean Road Elementary. I have listened to various members of the Alternate Calendar Commit tee present their ideas for the changes to the school calendar. I have read information mailed to the families of this community by the school board I have watched the television pro gram sponsored by the committee and the board.
I have also discussed this issue with different people so I could hear their views on this subject.
Unfortunately, every piece of information published by the school board, every forum held and every television program aired has been very one-sided. The make-up of the various panels, as well as the television program, has not always allowed an equal voice from those with an opposing view to the alternate school year.
Those who do not agree with the committee's views have been called a minority and uninformed. From what I have observed, the alternate school year proposition has not been a total democratic process. I fear our superintendent and the school board will nevertheless follow through with what they feel is the right course of action, regardless of how much opposition to this idea is expressed by what I have found to be a large and ever-growing movement to stop this change to our school year and change in how we will be forced to live in this community.
The Alternate Calendar Committee and members of the school board have voiced several reasons they feel this change is necessary at this time. During several meetings I attended, I heard them express their concerns with the 27 percent of the total student population that have a problem with meeting their academic requirements in several subjects. There have also been questions of the burn-out problem with a certain percent age of our teachers.
Another concern expressed is the length of the summer break and the time used at the first of each school year in reviewing those subjects learned at the end of the previous school year to make sure the information already taught has been retained.
I feel each of these issues has merit, but these are not the basis for changing the very make-up of an entire community. The percentage of schools in the country that have adopted single track year-round school calendars is less than 2 per cent. The state of Alabama has unfortunately ranked at the lower end of thc scale with other states in regard to overall test scores.
However, the Auburn school district has always ranked as one of the top school systems in our own state. Therefore, we should feel good with our educational system the way it is now. We should also realize if 98 percent of the country has elected not to be on a year round calendar and at least 40 other .states have found a way to teach their kids so they make better test scores than ours, we should be locating and analyzing those school districts and asking what they did without changing the entire fabric and nature of how we educate our children. It must be an academic app roach conducted during a standard school year. Very few have chosen the alternate year approach and of those who have, many are returning to the standard school year. They chose to return to the standard year because the alternate calendar simply did not work. They did away with year round schooling because it almost destroyed their communities. Again, it just does not work.
Oddly enough, there have been certain members of the board that have admitted that extending the school year will not help the percentage of school children that need remedial assistance to raise their test scores. Furthermore, there has not been a single piece of evidence found from any study or any school district that has adopted an alternate year that shows changing the school calendar has raised the academic level of any student or class of students.
Instead of initiating this type of change, one that is certain to fail and cause irreversible damage to our community, why not conduct a feasibility study of a teacher assistant program? A teacher assistant would help solve the problem with teacher fatigue, give vital assistance to those students that need additional help in understanding the information they need to comprehend through more one-on one involvement and the assistant program will generate a new group of teachers to fill new positions of responsibility that will have a better understanding and appreciation of the system by having experienced first hand what is required of them and the students before they graduate.
Also, there is the cost. I have not seen any information showing exactly how much changing the school calendar will impact the tax burden of families in this community or the financial impact it will have with the businesses here in Auburn as well as the surrounding cities. This change will certainly cost a tremendous amount of money. Even the school board has admitted that changing the calendar year may increase the over all school budget by as much as 5 percent.
With an annual school budget in the neighborhood of $27 million plus, that adds up to a lot of dollars. For the amount of money it will take to fund such a change, we can afford teacher assistants, more summer school help, additional remedial study programs, satellite teaching programs and more equipment and supplies to help with the current curriculums now in place. But, without a single piece of evidence showing the cost, how are we to know which way is the correct way?
We should not allow the school board to approve the alternate calendar year knowing that they will, months from now, show us how much this change will increase our cost of living in this community. They will show us how much our businesses will lose through this change and then they will expect each of us just to sit back and accept it without opposition. Once again, that scenario is not a part of the democratic process that has been, up to now, the basis of our very essence as a community and as a country.
I sincerely hope the superintendent, assistant superintendent and each member of the school board will seriously consider these points I have expressed, reconsider this proposal and stop this madness. If they are truly committed to the best interest of this school district and this community, then they must heed the voices of reason - those that have come forward giving their time and resources to express their opposition to this change, and allow the democratic process to move forward.
We do not need to be satisfied with just one simple survey which is clearly biased toward the case for year-round schooling. We have a constitutional right to a ballot vote. This is the only true democratic process that will allow everyone in the community an opportunity to express their own true feeling and choice. If the school board and the members of the committee are truly sincere in their desire to do what is best for our children and our children's children, then they should stop the rush for a decision to change our school year and do what thev should now know is in thc best interest of our community and our families.
"Doc" SatcherAuburn