| 115th Year, 48th Issue | Thursday, July 8, 2004 | Sparta, North Carolina |
Alleghany County Schools is one of 22 school systems statewide that likely would receive a waiver as part a new a school calendar bill, which was scheduled to be voted on in the legislature pass in the North Carolina General Assembly on July 6. Leaders in both the House and Senate have voiced support for the bill.
The legislation requires a new calendar for the state's public school systems that would require the school year starting no earlier than August 25 and ending no later than June 10. However, with the waiver, Alleghany would exempt from those absolute dates.
Even so, the county school board would not be able to set opening dates for schools. The N.C. Board of Education would mandate the start date based on the anticipated number of makeup days for "snow days" needed in each county.
In order to earn the exemption, local schools were required to have been closed eight days per year during any four of the last 10 years because of inclement weather or other emergency situations. Should the bill pass, the legislation would take effect at the start of the 2005-2006 school year.
On May 5, the Alleghany County Board of Education, in the absence of board member Steve Carpenter, unanimously voted to oppose the bill. Even with the waiver, local officials are still opposed to the bill because it lessens local control of the school calendar.
"I obviously am not in favor of Raleigh dictating to the local board of education what type of calendar the local board must adopt," said Alleghany County Superintendent of Schools Duane Davis. "I just see it as an abandoment of the ABCs legislation.
"When ABCs was passed, it was going to pass higher accountability on to
the local school districts and there would be punishments and rewards
for the high accountability. To secure maximum success, local
flexibility was promised. In my opinion, the calendar mandate is
breaking this promise."
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