The Triton School Board approved the 2021-2022 school calendar Monday. Superintendent Jeremy Riffle said it calls for a first day of class on August 11.
“We did look at a lot of parent feedback and a lot of staff feedback as it related to trying to start our school year just a little bit later,” Riffle told board members. “Everybody wants to start later, end early, and have all the breaks in between, and it just doesn’t work like that with 180 days necessary.”
Riffle told board members that it also includes a full two-week break for Christmas, with the last day of school a couple days after Memorial Day.
In the more immediate future, school officials are making plans to make up for the three days that were recently missed due to weather. Riffle said Triton’s first digital learning day will day place Saturday, February 27. “But I want to be very, very clear that that is not considered Saturday school,” he said. “So the students will have from Friday, [when] our teachers will post the information, until Wednesday to both watch the instruction and complete the assigned tasks that are taking place.”
While this coming Monday was scheduled as a possible makeup day, school officials didn’t think using it would give families enough notice, especially if they already made plans. That means Presidents’ Day will remain a vacation day.
A waiver from the state letting Triton track instruction by minutes rather than days means that each day of class that is missed won’t necessarily have to be made up, if students still get all of their hours in by the end of the school year.
