Saturday another school day for Huntsville district pupils

Longtime custodian Tobe Bohannan, who is 100 and still on the job, greets students Saturday as they exit buses and begin their school day in Huntsville.
Longtime custodian Tobe Bohannan, who is 100 and still on the job, greets students Saturday as they exit buses and begin their school day in Huntsville.

HUNTSVILLE - On most Saturdays, Madison Locke, 12, prefers to sleep in until 1 p.m. But this Saturday, she woke up at 6:30 a.m. to catch the bus to Huntsville Middle School.

Just after 8 a.m., she was sitting in Michelle Marsh’s seventh-grade English class taking a quiz and answering questions about adjectives.

“I don’t mind coming to school,” Madison said. “I make good grades.”

Snow and ice that were slow to melt have forced the Huntsville School District to cancel school 18 times since December. That adds up to more than three weeks of missed instruction, Superintendent Robert Allen said.

State regulations require 178 days of student instruction. Districts are required to incorporate at least five snow days into their calendars each year in case bad weather necessitates canceling classes.

At least 35 school districts in Northwest Arkansas are using all five of those days this year, and at least 26 districts - including Huntsville - are adjusting their calendars to make up 10 or more missed days on top of that.

Huntsville officials have amended their calendar so that if any weekday is missed because of weather, the next Saturday will be a school day. The change was implemented last week. Monday was a snow day, which meant Saturday was a school day.

Math teacher Ashley Woods used a bit of humor Saturday to lift the mood during her second-period class.

“Saturday school is better than cartoons,” she told seventh-graders as they settled into their seats.

Then, Woods and her class got busy learning about numbers. Woods asked students what they noticed about decimals that repeat in a pattern, such as 0.6666.

“You can change it to a fraction,” said seventh-grader Niya Bohannan, 12.

In art class, seventh-grader Kara Drewyor, 13, sat at a table with her classmates sketching a cow skull as part of a study on Georgia O’Keeffe, whose works include paintings of skulls. Kara asked teacher Michael Taylor for help in understanding how to use different shades of gray in her sketch.

Taylor said he was glad to have another day of class.

“Just having so many days off, it’s hard to come back to where we left off,” Taylor said. “This gives us a chance to finish a thought.”

About two-thirds of students showed up for classes Saturday on campuses in Huntsville and Saint Paul, which are both part of the Huntsville School District, Allen said. District officials excused absences for students who missed because of previously scheduled activities, Allen said.

Students in Eureka Springs, Fayetteville, Lincoln and Harrison have also had school on Saturdays.

The Harrison School District is also scheduling Saturday classes in weeks during which weekday sessions are canceled because of the weather, Superintendent Melinda Moss said. Harrison schools have closed 12 days since December.

The district’s most recent Saturday session was Feb. 8, she said. Going to school on Saturday during the same week as a missed weekday - instead of adding the Saturday onto a full five-day week - helps keep the district from having to pay overtime to hourly employees, she said.

Districts that include Bentonville, Rogers, Harrison and Clarksville plan to hold classes Monday, which is normally a scheduled holiday off to observe George Washington’s Birthday and Daisy Gatson Bates Day.

Huntsville’s school calendar this year spanned 184 days, with six more snow days than required by the state, Allen said. Those days, plus the Saturday session and two days of spring break, will be used to make up for some of the missed days. Unless the state Board of Education grants a waiver of the 178-day rule, the district’s school year will end June 12, instead of June 2.

Otherwise, Allen said, “We have no good options.”

Arkansas, Pages 19 on 02/16/2014

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