Havre Public Schools considering calendars for coming school year

The Havre Public Schools Board of Trustees is considering what calendar to adopt for the coming school year, including a 5-day/4-day hybrid schedule.

The schedules the board is considering are listed on the district’s website at https://www.blueponyk12.com including details on how much instructional time each contains, when vacation begins and ends, and the length of classes and days.

HPS Interim Superintendent Brad Moore said there are advantages and disadvantages to each option and the board is still discussing what they feel would work best for students.

“There’s pros and cons to each calendar,” he said. “There’s no such thing as a perfect one.”

The district’s website lists four possible calendars, the first of which is a traditional 5-day week with 176 instructional days and a one week spring break.

In this calendar, class periods will be 52 minutes long with classes running from 8:05 a.m. to 3:14 p.m. with a 45 minute lunch period for high school students.

The second calendar is a 5-day/4-day hybrid, with Support Fridays on the first and third Friday of each month from January to May.

Under this model, for the second half of the year, students would have most Fridays off, but twice or three times a week the school would be open to students who needed more help on certain subjects, which Moore said can be a real help for students.

This calendar would include 164 instructional days and 10 Support Fridays, with 55-minute classes running from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. with a 45 minute lunch break for high school students.

The third calendar would have students going to school five days a week from August through December, and from April through May, with Support Fridays every week January through March.

Like the second calendar this would include 164 instructional days with Support Fridays.

The website says this schedule may eliminate some of the Support Fridays for weeks that are already shortened by a holiday or sports events.

The fourth calendar is closer to a true 4-day week schedule, with Friday’s off from the second week of September through the end of the year, with the exception of the first and third weeks of January, and the first week of April.

This schedule would include Support Fridays the first and third week of each month from September through the end of the year.

This calendar would contain 153 instructional days with 58-minute class periods running from 8 a.m. to 3:51 p.m. with a 45 minute lunch period for high school students.

Moore said he and the school’s administrative team haven’t made a recommendation of one calendar over any other, and whatever the board chooses they can make it work.

He said the issue will likely be discussed at the board’s next meeting, but they set the agenda so he’s not 100 percent sure.

He also said the district’s website will be updated with any developments.