Thursday, Dallas ISD’s Board of Trustees heard a presentation about possible changes to the district's calendar for next year in an effort to increase student success and close the education gap from months of virtual learning.
“We’ve done some assessment with where they are at the beginning of the year and we know where they were when the left. So, we need to find out who is the furthest behind and support them,” Dallas ISD superintendent Michael Hinojosa said earlier this week. “We are going to have to start looking at some different calendars on how we organize our work, because these students are very far behind.”
Possible calendar models include Summer Learning, Intersession and Full-Year Redesign.
Summer Learning would mean the least amount of change if adopted and focus on students who need extra help.
Intersession would mean an earlier start date for everyone with 180 standard base days and targeted students would attend intersession learning days for specialized instruction.
The Full-Year Redesign would mean an entirely new calendar for all students with up to 210 standard base days.
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"We are very much in the early stages, we are not close to a decision yet and all of our community is going to have a chance to weigh in. But, we knew it was so important to at least have this conversation and explore what is the best interest for the Dallas ISD students," said Derek Little, the district's deputy chief academic officer.
He said the question is if they want to take advantage of new legislation hat allows the district to potentially extend learning opportunities to more days and weeks in the school year.
There are two school leader focus groups planned for Oct. 13 and Oct. 15. A task force is also looking into the plan.
It will be a while before anything is voted on.
See the full presentation HERE.
