Dearborn students will get to sleep a little later during district-wide online school and ease into the new school year with half days for the first week under recent changes to the school calendar.
Classes for all Dearborn Public School students will be a half day for the week of Monday, August 31 to Thursday, September 3. (Friday, Sept. 4, is a day off for the district.) The four half days will give staff additional time to learn new online teaching tools, including the Schoology and Zoom software that all teachers and students will be using during online instruction.
To make up for some of the half days, the district is eliminating the first three late starts planned for this year. Class will now resume at the regular time on September 23, October 14 and December 9.
The district is also adjusting its school hours during online learning. High schools, middle schools, kindergarten to 8th grade buildings, and both Salina schools will start class at 8:15 a.m. with the school day ending at 3:10 p.m. and half days ending at 11:10 a.m. Most elementary schools will start class at 8:55 a.m. and finish by 3:50 p.m. on a regular online day and at noon on a half day.
Middle and high school students will have their first to third hour classes on Aug. 31 and Sept. 2 and their fourth through sixth hour courses Sept. 1 and 3.
All the new schedule changes apply to both the traditional and Virtual Learning Program students. When the district returns to the school in the buildings, start times for all students will revert back to the traditional hours, generally 7:20 for high school, 8 a.m. for middle school and 8:40 for elementary. Students in the Virtual Learning Program will also move back to the traditional start times.
“With all students starting the year online, we do not have to worry about daily busing. Without busing, we can adjust our class schedules to make it a little easier for students, especially the high school teens whom we know would rather not be in class at 7:20 each morning,” said Superintendent Glenn Maleyko.
Administrators worked with the Dearborn Federation of Teachers to adjust the school calendar. The changes still need official approval by the Board of Education, but that is expected to happen at their next meeting on Monday, Aug. 24. District calendars can be found at https://dearbornschools.org/services/district-calendars/.
Dearborn Public Schools is starting online for the entire district at least until Oct. 1. The Board will reevaluate conditions in September to see if students can begin to shift back to more in-building learning. Students in the Virtual Learning Program signed up to take classes online for the entire school year.
During online learning, students will still be expected to participate in live class every day. How those school days will look, especially for the elementary students, is still being finalized.
“We know this school year is bringing with it a lot of changes. We appreciate the patience from our parents, families and staff as we make adjustments to serve our students the best we can in the unprecedented environment created by COVID-19,” Dr. Maleyko said.
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