Unusually harsh winter may cause graduation delay in school district
Mapletown Junior-Senior High School seniors may be well advised to hold off on ordering graduation announcements based on the Southeastern Greene School District calendar. Still grappling with days students must make up in the wake of an unusually harsh winter that may still have some snow to offer, school officials like superintendent Dr. Philip Savini Jr. are sure to change the graduation date,
“I’m going to hold off, just in case, and then we’ll do a final calendar,” Savini said.
At a recent meeting, the school board discussed revising the school calendar to make up for days lost so far to bad weather; however, the board and administrators questioned whether the schools may get a reprieve for the days lost when Pennsylvania leaders declared a state of emergency Feb. 17.
The state Department of Education has yet to make any special provisions for those days.
“They do have to make those up,” education department spokeswoman Shanna McClintock said.
On that President’s Day holiday, some schools were set to open their doors as a make-up day for previous snow cancellations, but the season’s biggest storm hit, forcing the cancellation of classes throughout the region.
Many schools remained closed a second consecutive day, and a few like Albert Gallatin Area and Uniontown Area even took a third day off.
McClintock said the days are being treated like any other days missed, regardless of the snow disaster. She said the department has fielded calls about the snow days and whether the schools must make up the emergency days, although she acknowledged no special directive has been sent out to the schools.
The department did allow, because of the snow, a three-day extension to school districts where sixth- and 11th-graders were in the midst of taking the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) writing test.
“I guess they were in the middle of the writing portion of the PSSA and got a three-day extension,” McClintock said.
McClintock said the state has given no extensions for the PSSA math and reading tests scheduled for this spring.
The state requires 180 days of school as well as 990 hours of classroom time for the secondary-level students and 900 hours for elementary students.
The school year must end by June 30, which is the end of the fiscal year. McClintock said school districts can get a reprieve on their final graduation date but only when they reach a point when they have no make-up day options.
“There is a reprieve for seniors. If the school can’t complete 180 days by the graduation date, they can submit the initial calendar and the revised calendar to the (education department secretary), saying they can’t complete 180 days, and they can get a reprieve,” she said.
She said a school district’s calendar may be revised at any time in the school year.
Southeastern Greene has missed four school days and logged 13 two-hour delays.
Worried there could be more snow on the way and unsure if the snow disaster days counted, Savini said he would like to delay a revision of the school calendar at least until mid-March, in an effort to avoid confusion.