School board members will get their first peek at the 2012-13 school year calendar Monday.
The Burke County Board of Education has a work session planned for 6 p.m. at the West Concord Resource Center at 509 W. Concord St.
Interim Superintendent Larry Putnam and a calendar committee have come up with several options for getting 185 days of school on the calendar.
Putting pressure on next year’s calendar is the five extra days the state legislature added to the year, going from 180 school days to 185 days.
State law doesn’t allow school systems to start before Aug. 25 and go beyond June 10.
However, Burke may qualify for a waiver to start the school year earlier.
Putnam said the school system may be able to get an earlier start date because students have missed eight days due to bad weather four of the past 10 years.
The school system, though, has to have a proposed calendar ready before it applies for the waiver.
An earlier start may help the calendar committee squeeze in exams before the Christmas break, Putnam said, which would benefit high schoolers. This year, exams were held in mid-January, and Putnam said it is harder for students to retain information over a long break.
The Burke County Board of Elections also has asked that schools be closed for the Nov. 6 General Election as three elementary schools are used as polling places, and the elections board has concerns about student safety with so many voters on campuses.
The five-year subcommittee, which held its first meeting Feb. 13, also is on Monday’s agenda to give a report and set its next meeting. During the initial meeting the subcommittee members set priorities for the school system, including re-staffing, reducing mobile classrooms at overcrowded schools and addressing old elementary school buildings.
One option discussed at the Feb. 13 meeting was turning an empty elementary school building into a school similar to a magnet school that would focus on foreign language and technology.
The Mountain View Elementary School building has been empty since the 2010 school year when it was consolidated with Hillcrest Elementary School to form Mountain Crest Elementary School.
Other items on Monday’s agenda include the board:
» Hearing from Putnam on student discipline due process notices.
» Holding a first reading on the student code of conduct and a second reading on the personnel selection policy.
» Discussing a teaching fellows resolution.
» Hearing budget and personnel reports.
» Upcoming meeting
» The final public input meeting to get ideas during the superintendent search process is set for 6 p.m. Tuesday at Heritage Middle School.
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