Last day moves up to June 16
By Gene Robbins, Managing Editor
School will start before Labor Day next September, the Board of Education decided Monday night.
Members approved a 2015-16 calendar that has teachers report on Tuesday, Sept. 1, and students on Thursday, Sept. 3. Labor Day falls on Monday, Sept. 7.
The calendar keeps a full spring break from March 21-25. Graduation and end of school would be Thursday, June 16. The calendar builds in two snow days, and establishes a set of priority of makeup days.
The first week in November is choppy; school is in session Monday and Wednesday, Nov. 2 and 4, but off on Nov. 4 (Election Day) and Nov. 5 and 6 for the NJEA convention.
The school board learned last month that high school graduation will likely return to the campus in June 2015. Hillsborough held its Class of 2014 graduation in Trenton’s Sun Bank Arena, which has told the school it cannot accommodate it next June. An indoor ceremony holds two major advantages: a controlled, air-conditioned environment, and allowing almost an unlimited number to attend the ceremony without the need to deal with tickets.
Board member Greg Gillette was one of two votes opposing the calendar, He didn’t like the early start, while acknowledging the tradeoff was the relatively early dismissal of June 16. He said starting before Labor Day "was "a little bit elitist" because some people who cannot plan vacation well in advance, or have little vacation, tend to take that holiday weekend as a mini-break.
The building of a calendar was one of the more dreaded tasks of the education committee every year, member Judy Haas said.
There seem to be innumerable considerations. Heat in June is one, and it tends to be more bothersome than warm days in September, said both student representative Cassidy Pezza and board member Christopher Pulsifer. Some students want to end earlier in June to get a start on college courses; others want to begin work.
Setting the graduation day is important for the year-long planning of Project Graduation. Starting earlier helps add teaching days early in the year to help prepare students for national tests that come early in the school year, said member Lorraine Soisson. She said you also don’t want summer breaks to get too long because of learning dropoff over the summer, and kids get antsy to return by the end of August.
Requests for more school holidays, like Diwali, will only make the task harder in the future, Mr. Pulsifer said.
In the end, you do your best, said Ms. Haas.
"If we make a terrible mistake, we learn and adjust the next year," she said.
News that the high school graduation will likely be back on campus in June 2015 underscored the need to approve a school calendar a year and one-half in advance, said Superintendent Jorden Schiff at the October meeting.