Knox schools chief to present budget

[Lola Alapo]

Knox County school officials are proposing later start times for some high schools as a way to decrease transportation costs.

Positions also are being eliminated in the district's administrative office and systemwide including 38 custodians. They come after position cuts in elementary, middle and high schools in areas such as career and technical education.

Knox County Schools Superintendent Jim McIntyre today will present the Knox County school board with his budget proposal for the 2009-10 budget year.

"It's a very difficult economic environment," he said. "On the plus side, it's pushing us to be as efficient, as creative as possible to maximize our dollars and give our kids the best education."

McIntyre is proposing a $374 million budget for next year. The current budget is $370 million. The board votes on the budget April 15.

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[Cathy McCaughan]

Fairfax County Public Schools proposed later start times for high school students. Two websites were created to express opinions and research in favor of and opposed to high school students starting the day later than elementary students. The attempts to start high school at 9:30 eventually failed.

[Knox County Teacher]

How many administrative jobs have they cut?

[ChangeAgent]

Three jobs were cut in Central Office, if I remember reading correctly. I believe, however, that at least twice that number were CREATED this year - so I am relatively certain that Central Office is operating into next year with a net GAIN in positions.

[Cathy McCaughan]

No. High School ends at 3:30 now. Schools that begin at 9:30 will end at 4:30.

[Heather Marshall]

Up, you make some very good suggestions...I sure hope the KCS board reads your comments and considers your suggestions.

I have another suggestion. Why not zone students to go to the school that is closest to where they live. There are 3 buses in my neighborhood every morning...it could be 2 instead of 3 if the high school students were zoned for the school closest to the neighborhood. This seems like it would be such an easy way to save busing costs.

[granma2]

Changing a school start time seems to be the easiest way to save money if we are not going to have a tax increase to prevent teacher layoffs and reductions in programs. If it would save money to have all high schools start later, then I would be in favor of that also. Having them all start later would also align their extra-curricular programs and sports. There are school buses for children whose parents work, and if they live within the parent responsibility zone, high schoolers are old enough to walk to school. Teens with jobs should not even be a consideration in this debate since the primary job of anyone who has not graduated from high school should be graduating -- not a job. I doubt there are many teens who are supporting their families on after school jobs. Perhaps they are paying car insurance, cell phone bills, manicures, and $100 tennis shoe bills, but all those are desires not needs. We've commented on other threads here that the state of academia in our county is deplorable. No time should be wasted on debating what time school starts and ends. Those types of decisions should be left to the elected school board.

I agree with Up that we need the arts, but plenty of math, science, and English teachers have also been cut.

[Debi]

The child may need to work & have a college track and not want a vocational training.

[Cathy McCaughan]

Tennessee Vocational Rehabilitation scholarships for college/career training will be almost non-existent beginning this fall.

[Debi]

I can say STUDENT LOANS are non-existent. I got word today, at the moment I have no clue how I will pay for my final year of college. My federal loans are not enough and the private loans I was getting a year ago with no problem are suddenly not even doing student loans any more. I know God will provide, HE always does. But until He comes through I don't have a clue. I would imagine lots of other college students are having this issue at the moment. Anyone wanna donate $10k to a future nurse?

[Pamela Treacy]

As elected officials this is decided by the school board -- but I don't think this should just be "left" to them. Changing the start times of our high school day, even in 7 schools, changes many things for the community. It effects parents, teachers, businesses of the schools set to start later as well as the parents, teachers, businesses of all the other schools who interact with them at athletic events and other functions like church groups, non-high school sports clubs, dance studios.

I am all for saving money, but this changes our local culture.

I read the information about the studies about sleeping patterns. I really don't get this. I don't recall this as an issue growing up.

[Beth Love]

My high school students (particularly my honors kids) are almost unanimous in wishing to start earlier than later. They cite Oak Ridge's start times for their high school students (7:30-2:30). My kids say that they would be home from activities by 5 o'clock or so and be able to get homework done by a reasonable time and have time for family. Most crave, believe it or not, dinner at home with their families.

[granma2]

An article about the circadian rhythm of teenagers is below. It shows evidence that teens don't need more sleep than younger children, they just need it at a different time of day. Starting school later will be beneficial to them.

http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/clocks/fall/teenagers.html