San Elizario Independent School District moves to 4-day school week. Here's what to know.

The San Elizario Independent School District’s School Board voted 4-1 Wednesday to transition their school and work schedule for the upcoming school year to a four-day week.

Students will now attend classes Tuesday through Friday. Teachers, faculty and staff will also work at the district campuses Tuesday through Friday. The 2023-2024 school year begins July 25.

San Elizario is the first district in El Paso to move to a 4-day school week, but joins 41 other districts throughout Texas that have moved to a 4-day school week, San Elizario Independent School District Superintendent Jeannie Meza-Chavez said.

Here is what you need to know heading into the new school year:

Why change to a four-day week schedule?

One of the main goals of the new schedule is to bring new teachers to the district to meet the teaching shortage and to ensure students receive the highest quality of education, Meza-Chavez said.

She continued that the four-day week will make teaching at the district more enticing to teachers to join San Elizario Independent School District.

"It's already happening in other employment job markets. You see different businesses and different areas exploring a different style of a work week, and we need to pay attention to that," Meza-Chavez said. "In education, we can't continue to just do what has been done, not only by us but all the districts in the region and throughout Texas and just keep posting there's this vacancy and there's another vacancy. If we don't dare to do something different so that every one of our students is able to have a certified teacher in their classroom then we're not owning up to our mission. We're not owning up to what we're saying to our community, our families."

San Elizario Independent School District currently has substitute teachers instructing classes including in their science department.

"The conversation really changes when you are a parent of a child who has had a guest teacher, which is a substitute covering classes, and that's kind of what happened last year on a bigger scale,” Meza-Chavez said. “We have seven science positions at our high school, and out of those seven positions, five of those were being covered by guest teachers. We wanna make sure that every single child in our district has the opportunity to have quality science instruction. That's just one example. We have vacancies throughout our district, in our elementary and our secondary schools."

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What will be the biggest challenge?

Teachers, students and parents adjusting to change will be the biggest challenge to overcome, Meza-Chavez said.

"It's not something that has been done before in our area. We expect that we're going to have critics of why it won't work, but I can tell you that we're fully prepared for this to work, Meza-Chavez said. "We have a passionate group of individuals in our district who are going to make sure that we think from every perspective on what could work. It is definitely going to be a change. It's going to be an adjustment and that's always hard."

Why was the decision made in January?

The new school year calendar was brought to the school board in January in order to allow district officials and parents enough time to prepare for the new schedule, Meza-Chavez said. The new school year begins July 25.

"We are just beginning the preparation," Meza-Chavez said. "Much like when we went from a traditional calendar to a year-round calendar, there's a process that needs to be followed. And that's why our calendar went to the board in January because we wanted this time to be able to prepare and plan for transition to a four day week."

What help will be provided to parents who work Mondays and can’t be home with their children?

Parents were given notice of the school calendar change six months before the school year to give them ample time to make accommodations for their children, Meza-Chavez said.

The district is also looking to partner with other organizations such as the Y to help parents, she added.

"Our educational system in San Elizario is that we are building the future. We are building future champions," Meza-Chavez said. And so, for our parents who obviously are concerned about childcare, the fact that we have six months before school starts which is a lot more notice than our parents received when we unfortunately had to close down schools when the (Covid-19) pandemic hit."

She added, "That is part of the planning and the adjustments that our parents obviously are going to have to pay close attention to. The great thing is that we have six months to continue to develop partnerships with local entities to make sure that we're able to make this transition in the best possible way."

Will students receive the same amount of instructional hours?

The new four-day week school calendar will not change the amount of instructional time students receive, Meza-Chavez said. San Elizario Independent School District will remain well above the minimum requirements set by the Texas Education Agency, she added.

"Every year those minutes can fluctuate," Meza-Chavez said. "Districts must meet the minimum required minutes, which the TEA says is 75,600 minutes. We already exceed the minimum requirement and will continue to do so. Our district will be at 76,515 for the 2023 school year."

Why was Monday selected as the off day?

Various reasons went into the district’s decision to go to a Tuesday through Friday schedule including days of the week that tend to have a high number of absences from students, federal holidays and school events.

"We wanted to know what were the days that our employees and students missed the most and that was Monday. The second day that came in was Friday," Meza-Chavez said. “So then we looked at federal holidays which are on Mondays, so that was another factor, another decision point. Then we looked at Fridays, but administrators and certain teachers or coaches really wouldn't be off because that's when we have busy athletic events for our students.”

She added, “So we truly wanted to look at a calendar where our students and our employees are able to take that extra opportunity, that one day, to look at their social, emotional, physical health and be able to take that mental break."

Is the change going to change the salaries of teachers, faculty and staff?

The change to the schedule will not impact the current salaries of school district employees, Meza-Chavez said.

"Absolutely not," Meza-Chavez said. "We would never propose something that is going to negatively impact our employees. Absolutely not."

For more information on San Elizario Independent School District’s change to a four-day school week, visit seisd.net.

This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: San Elizario Independent School District moves to 4-day school week