Winter vacation in the Salt Lake City School District just got shorter for most students.
School will be held Monday, Dec. 21, to allow for a snow day, the Salt Lake City Board of Education voted last Tuesday.If vicious winter storms never come, school will not be held Friday, May 28, making for a long Memorial Day weekend. Year-round schools won't change, as they have their own snow days.
"We're not going to make everyone happy," board President Karen Derrick said before voting.
The decision changes the Saturday, June 5, date set aside for school should weather prompt school closures.
"I hate to go against a decision that's already been made," said board member Cliff Higbee, stressing the issue did not go to the school community councils due to time constraints. "However, no one's going to come June 5, except the teachers. . . . It seems like a strange day for snow makeup."
The snow day issue boiled last February when Mother Nature brought to the Salt Lake Valley several feet of snow amid the morning commute in the third worst winter storm on record. Still, no schools closed, infuriating parents and prompting dozens of angry phone calls to district offices.
Although the June snow date was chosen in 1996 by more than 15,700 weighted votes from each school, some PTA presidents last year complained the date would be unproductive. Saturday also is the Sabbath for some religions.
"We felt it was worth the effort to try to reschedule," said regional PTA director Marjorie King, who sat on a committee to examine the snow day. "There will not be quality education that day."
The committee met four times before recommending teachers bump Career Ladder day from Feb. 16 to Feb. 15, which is Presidents Day, and conduct class Feb. 16. If a snow day is not taken, schools could decide to end the school year early or have no school Friday, May 28.
That recommendation, however, clashed with teachers, said Elaine Tzourtzouklis, president of the Salt Lake Teachers Association. While students would have been least affected, teachers would have worked a federal holiday or risked losing pay. Also, 34 teachers will be out of town that day.
"I'm asking we leave the snow day on Saturday. We can make it as positive as we want it to be," committee member Tzourtzouklis said, later confirming that she will support the board's decision because it is less harmful to teachers.
King also says she supports the board decision in "support of parents and their interest in doing what is best for their children's education," but adds she was surprised by Tzourtzouklis' response to the recommendation.
Meanwhile, the district staff will revisit next year's snow day, apparently scheduled after the school year ends. And schools will take on the task of notifying parents of the calendar change. Snow days have been called twice in 20 years.
- In other business, the board learned an $8.2 million project to air-condition East, West and Highland high schools will be complete by fall 1999.
But the schools' built-in cooling capacities differ, with East's duct system making for easy installation compared to the "major challenge" at West, constructed some 80 years ago, said Howard Van Boerum of VanBoerum & Frank Associates Inc., a consulting engineering firm hired by the district.
East's hall ceilings will need to be torn up to put in piping, but six-month construction, to begin in late March, won't affect class-rooms.
West, however, needs separate thermostats installed in every classroom. Van Boerum suggested crews could work nights to prevent disruption, but they would charge 10 percent more in labor costs. Highland requires installation of additional systems, though not to West's extent, and may require work in classrooms.