Middle school schedules finally settled

The county's long-criticized middle school schedule will finally be overhauled next year with a change from a four to a six-period day, school officials said in a proposal unveiled yesterday.

The new schedule will have periods 58 minutes long, instead of the 86 minutes that critics said are too long for the attention span of middle school students. And it will leave more time for elective classes like art and music.

"It certainly looks like a win for students," said Eric Sullivan, chairman of the countywide Citizen Advisory Committee, a parent group that advises the Board of Education and that last year slammed Dr. Maxwell for not fixing the schedule. "From the community CAC perspective, this looks like good news."

Under the proposal, the schedule would change at the start of the 2009-10 school year at a cost of $7.4 million.

It requires hiring additional teachers for science, social studies and elective classes and also to keep class sizes down.

The county Board of Education will have to put that funding in the budget for the plan to go through, said schools spokesman Bob Mosier.

Those close to the process said county leaders are "supposedly" on board with the plan and it should survive the budget process.

The county executive's office was contacted late this morning and did not have time to respond to questions about the funding.

The schedule was unveiled last night at Brooklyn Park Middle School to an invited group of parents and community members who had been active on the county's middle school task force about two years ago.

Many of those parents were upset last year when they learned the schools would make only a slight change to the schedule, returning science and social studies to semester-long classes. That wasn't enough - middle school students need year-long core classes and electives, they said.

Under the new schedule, students will take language arts, math, science and social studies every day all year. They'll also have more time for foreign languages and electives in the two daily "encore" periods.

The schedule will be different for students in each grade. All sixth grade students will get a sampling of electives like technology, family and consumer sciences and art on a rotating schedule, but by eighth grade they'll be able to choose longer periods of those courses.

"I think it's a huge improvement. For the first time in eight years they've made progress," said Terra Snider, a CAC member who has long advocated for a better middle school schedule.

It's not perfect, but it's a big improvement over the current schedule because it gives middle school students a well-rounded education, she said. She added that the six-period plan is similar to a middle school schedule the county had about eight years ago, before school officials cut back on electives to add extra time for language arts.

Theoretically, the new schedule also gives teachers more planning time. Teachers will have two of six periods free each day; right now they have one of four periods free.

That may help reduce teacher workload, which has been an increasing concern of the local teachers' union. But whether that time is given to teachers to plan for their lessons or is taken up by meetings remains to be seen, said Tim Mennuti, president of the union.

"That's the question," he said. "The thing everyone agrees on is the system for middle schools isn't working. Something has to change at the middle schools."

Middle school performance has been an increasingly thorny issue for county educators. Student scores on standardized tests are high for elementary schools but slip when students start middle school. That lag remains when they reach ninth grade, leaving high schools tasked with pulling their achievement back up to where it should be.

"There's no magic solution to middle school reform," Mr. Mosier said. "If there was, somebody would have put it in place by now. We think this is a big step forward."

School officials are asking for public comment on the schedule. A form for feedback will be online at www.aacps.org. Dr. Maxwell will present the schedule at the Sept. 3 school board meeting at 10 a.m., at 2644 Riva Road in Parole.