Barrington District 220 hashes out details of new start times
This story has been updated to state that Barrington High School students will begin classes 70 minutes later at 8:30 a.m. in 2017-18.
Barrington Area Unit District 220 officials have addressed logistics such as early dismissal for bad weather as they prepare to implement new start times in the 2017-18 academic season.
Students in first grade through senior year of high school will begin classes Monday, Aug. 21. High school and middle school students will start their school day later, while elementary school children arrive earlier.
Linda Klobucher presented her final report on the new start times shortly before retiring June 30 as assistant superintendent of teaching and learning. In it, she said officials addressed some logistics in the last stages of planning for the changes.
When inclement weather forces early student dismissal, District 220 will stick with its current procedure. That means high school and middle school students will depart first, so they can be home before younger siblings in the elementary buildings who require child care and to be off the roads as quickly as possible.
“After hours of discussions, we decided we wanted to maintain that (current procedure),” Klobucher said.
Superintendent Brian Harris said parents of the younger elementary children need enough time to get home from work when an early dismissal occurs.
Also, work hours for support employees will be adjusted. For example, there will be coverage to answer telephone calls from 7 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
The new start times led the district to address its energy conservation program. Heating and cooling systems will be synchronized with the new schedules.
Barrington High School students will begin 70 minutes later by attending classes from 8:30 a.m. to 3:21 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. They'll be at the high school from 8:30 a.m. to 3:13 p.m. Wednesday.
District 220's two middle schools will begin at 9 a.m. instead of 7:55 a.m., ending at 3:48 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. They'll be in school from 9 a.m. to 3:18 p.m. Wednesday.
Elementary schools will begin at 8 a.m., an hour earlier, and end at 2:40 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. The Wednesday session will run from 8 a.m. to 2:10 p.m.
“I have to say, a huge shout-out to all the building principals,” Klobucher said. “Each building principal has looked at every physical piece they need to on the building level, because we all have our own footprint and what that's going to look like at each building, and who's doing what and how everything is going to be covered.”
District 220 was represented in the spring at the inaugural Adolescent Sleep, Health and School Start Times National Conference, which featured experts from Harvard Medical School and University of Minnesota.
Information compiled from conference experts shows teenagers' brains during adolescence have a shift in their sleep-wake cycles due to developmental changes that signal when to feel tired. That means teens typically cannot fall asleep before about 10:45 p.m. and they remain in the sleep mode until roughly 8 a.m.
Elementary schoolchildren are biologically capable of falling asleep in early evening and rising early without ill effects, according the conference experts.