CTU ON THE SCHOOL DAY ISSUE

Issue 1: There is little evidence that extended learning time leads to more learning. (Cuban, 2008; Patall, 2010,)On the other hand, there are many known ways to increase student achievement including smaller classes (Boyd-Zaharias), working relationships among parents/community/teachers (Bryk), and a student-centered learning climate (Bryk).

Cuban, L. (2008, December). The Perennial reform: Fixing school time.Phi Delta Kappan, 90(4), 240–250.

“Extending the School Day or School Year: A Systematic Review of Research (1985-2009)” by Erika Patall, Harris Cooper, and Ashley Batts Allen inReview of Educational Research, September 2010 (Vol. 80, #3, p. 401-436)

Bryk, A., Sebring, P., Allensworth, E., Luppescu, S., & Easton, J. (2009). Organizing schools for improvement: Lessons from Chicago. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press.

Boyd-Zaharias, J., & Pate-Bain, H. (2000). Early and new findings from Tennessee’s Project STAR. The CEIC

Review, 9(2), 4.

Issue 2: Chicago schools have more instructional time per year than either New York or Los Angeles. The CTU figures (below) do not include student lunch as part of instructional time.

Issue 3: Houston has 10 more days in its school year. The rest of the Houston-Chicago difference can be explained by the organization of the school day. The Houston school day is 7 hours long. Within that day, students and teachers eat lunch (time varies by school) and teachers have a 45 minute preparation period. Chicago teachers also work a 7 hour day. Although elementary school start and therefore end times vary, a normal school day is 8:30 to 3:30, with a 30-minute preparation period at the beginning of the day and a 45-minute lunch at the end of the day.

Student instructional hours are fewer in Chicago than in Houston, even though teachers work the same number of hours. Why is that? It is because of the way the Chicago elementary schools are organized. The high schools stagger teachers’ lunch and preparation periods so that students are receiving instruction for the entire 7 hours, minus their lunch. The elementary schools could be reorganized to accomplish the same thing. They could do this by increasing art, music, library and physical education in elementary schools and staggering teachers’ preparation periods and lunch, as is done in the high schools.

Chicago / New York / Los Angeles, single track / Los Angeles, multi- track / Houston
instructional hours per day ES / 5.42 / 5 / 5.17 / 5.71 / 6.5
instructional days per year ES / 170 / 182 (max.) / 175 / 159 / 180
instructional hours per year ES / 921 / 910 / 904 / 909 / 1170
instructional hours per day HS / 6.11 / 5.5 / 5.17 / 5.71 / 6.5
instructional days per year HS / 170 / 181 / 175 / 159 / 180
instructional hours per year HS / 1039 / 995.5 / 904 / 909 / 1170

CPS uses different figures:

  • Their figures include student lunch. Student lunch is not instructional time. This matters because Chicago students only have 20 minutes for lunch; students in other districts have longer, so in some cases what appears to be more instructional time is simply more time for student lunch.
  • CPS figures are wrong for Los Angeles. For the 2010-2011 school year, L.A. reduced the number of school days by 5. There will be a further reduction during the 2011-2012 year.
  • CPS figures add 37.5 minutes to New York’s school day. The 37.5 minutes are part of a special program for certain targeted students and should not be included in general calculations.

How Chicago numbers were calculated:

Elementary students go to school from 9 a.m. until 2:45, according to the CTU-CPS Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). They have 20 minutes for lunch and the rest is instructional time. High School students have various start and end times, but must have 367 instructional minutes per day, also according to the CBA. The number of days per year includes instructional days only—not holidays, professional development days, report card pick up days, etc. This information came from the CPS calendar.

How Los Angeles numbers were calculated:

Los Angeles Schools have several different tracks; students either attend school for 175 days a year, and average 1550 minutes a week or attend school for 159 days and average 1715 minutes a week (UTLA Contract, and The average per day is instructional time and does not include student lunch. The contract indicates that “daily minutes will vary due to professional development and early student release on Tuesday” implying that the numbers may overstate the actual total instructional hours per year.

How New York numbers were calculated:

New York school hours vary. The maximum number of days and minimum number of hours are set by the New York Department of Education, and these are the numbers used by CTU. According to the student attendance calendar listed here, , the most number of elementary days possible is 182 and the maximum high schools days is 181. Elementary (K-6) students go to school 5 hours a day and middle & high school (7-12) students go to school 5.5 hours a day, exclusive of lunch. (Source: )

How Houston numbers were calculated:

Calendar shows 180 school days. According to , all schools are required to have a 7 hour instructional day. From looking at a few school websites, it is clear that the 7 hours includes lunch (for example, Louisa May Alcott School: school hours are 7:45 to 2:45.) Also, Alcott, for example, has an early dismissal schedule as well—some days school ends 2 hours, 15 minutes early. These early dismissals are not accounted for in the chart above because they vary from school to school. Lunch time varies from school to school, and to be fair, some schools go longer than 7 hours. For this report, 6.5 hours were used, based on the minimum of 7 hours and assuming ½ hour for lunch. Houston teachers are required to have a minimum of 45 minutes planning within the instructional day (