Extending school days and year will continue flux in DCPS
The Chancellor of DC Public Schools is hell bent on transitioning the entire District, mainly vis a vis most beleaguered schools, to an extended day and school year. The Mayor and Chancellor recently announced a list of roughly ten schools who will be implementing an extended school year of 20 days. These schools are all in blighted Wards 7 and 8, so it will be obvious to all residents of DC that only the poor kids go to school for longer days and years. Their presence in school uniforms longer than their same age peers across the city will further underscore their entrapment.
The assumption is that more time equals better outcomes, and we know from research that the results are so mixed that no significant investments in increasing school time should be made. But as a cosmetic political change, increasing school minutes and school days are easy metrics to gauge the seriousness of education reform efforts.
The Washington Teachers’ Union has made it clear to members that any extension of the day or calendar is a violation of the pre-existing contract. Any school that implements an extended day or year is operating outside the boundaries of the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Teachers are technically within their rights to refuse to participate in either proposition, and technically without fear of reprobation. But any DCPS teacher knows that, within the current evaluation regime, there are ways administration can punish teachers who do not comply, even though non-compliance is non-punishable in certain instances.
For instance, a teacher, in many schools, can refuse to participate in extended day activities. They will not receive additional pay at a prescribed hourly rate, but they will not technically experience any blowback from that decision. However, the current IMPACT evaluation system uses something called “Commitment to School Culture”, or CSC, to evaluate teachers. Principals possess great leverage to define what Commitment means. In some cases, Commitment can mean participation in after school activities. So, if a teacher refuses, they can be dinged on their CSC score. Or, principals can and do find ways to under rate teaching as a form of punishment for unrelated acts of defiance.
When implementing extended school day and year by fiat, specifically in low-income schools in Wards 7 and 8, the District is once again contributing to the churn of teachers in these schools. In February of the current school year, teachers and the public were notified that certain schools were going to extended school year. This adjustment of the school calendar is only legally negotiable at the union and District level, not Extending school days and year will continue flux in DCPS – @ THE CHALKFACE:
