SHIOCTON Wis. (WFRV) – School District of Shiocton officials are trying to avoid having to extend their school year so students can make up the eight days they missed due to the severe flooding last month.
On Monday night, the district’s school board unanimously approved a resolution that will allow the district administrator to send a waiver request to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction. If the Wisconsin DPI approves the request, Shiocton students wouldn’t have to make up those eight days.
There’s a required number of instructional hours a district must provide to their students each school year. Normally, if the district doesn’t meet these requirements using their regularly scheduled school days they must tack on days at the end of the school year.
Flooding conditions got so bad in Shiocton last month that officials issued an evacuation order leaving students unable to attend school in person or virtually for eight days. District officials said that the flooding displaced about one-third of its students and about a quarter of its staff.
“The routine of being in school at a certain time, steady lunch when lunch was being served, seeing your friends, socialization that was all disrupted for them (by the flooding),” School District of Shiocton administrator Garrett Zimmerman told Local 5 News.
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Zimmerman listed several reasons why he believes not making up those eight days is best for the district. He said extending the school year would disrupt their summer school schedule and delay construction on referendum projects. He also said adjusting staff contracts to account for the extra days of school wouldn’t be easy to do.
He told Local 5 News that he isn’t worried about the missed learning time if the district doesn’t extend the school year. He said a big reason for that is the missed days coincided with state testing and ACT prep so kids didn’t miss as much curriculum as they would have if the eight-day hiatus happened at a different point in the school year.
A teacher who spoke at the meeting on Monday night agreed with Zimmerman saying she’s not worried about the missed learning time.
“The couple grammar lessons we’re going to skip now to make up for those days so we can finish the literature section, they’re going to be okay, they’ve got a lot out of the school year already,” Shiocton teacher Michelle Sixel said.
“We really looked at what we need to do before the end of the year, not so much what’s nice or other things to add on, let’s just go to the basics that students need,” Zimmerman said in regards to how teachers will approach the rest of the year.
Everybody who spoke at the board meeting on Monday night was against the district extending the school year to make up the flood days. They also pushed back against the notion that the kids weren’t learning in the days they couldn’t come to school.
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“The lessons they learned were stuff they couldn’t learn in school, learning about compassion and some of our kids were going through it themselves with their families (being impacted by the floods),” School District of Shiocton parent Amy Austin said.
“I don’t think we could have taught them anymore than they learned during that time,” teacher Sally Ritchie said. “I saw so many of my students and our young people doing sandbagging, showing compassion, what they learned during this time is something outstanding.”
Ultimately, the Department of Public Instruction will have the final say on whether or not to approve Shiocton’s waiver request. A spokesperson for the department said they’re working with the district, but at this time couldn’t comment on whether or not they’d approve the district’s request for the waiver.
The scheduled last day of school for the School District of Shiocton is June 5.
