Rumor Has It

I happen to know, from an inside source, that tomorrow at our weekly team leaders' meeting, someone will bring up the issue of after school study hall. As long as I've been at my school, the sixth grade has offered what we call "Homework Club" every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday for an hour after school. Historically, it started out a little on the punitive side; we offered it as a place to get some help and a head start on your homework, but it was run as an after school detention, too. It took a few years to separate those two very different activities, but once we did, the study hall became a much more productive place.

It's always one of the first interventions we suggest to students who are struggling, and mid-year, especially after progress reports go home, we really get a full house. 15-20 kids come voluntarily (or with a bit of parental prodding). In addition to being staffed by a team teacher, we have supplies and text books; we give them a snack and a frequent attendance punch card that they can trade for a few points of extra credit, too. For some of our kids, all that turns out to be very helpful.

So helpful, in fact, that a few years ago, our school adopted it as a blanket policy. Our principal removed all of our before and after school hall duty time in exchange for the teachers on each team agreeing to provide study hall three days a week. On our team, this year, that worked out to thirteen days each where we committed to staying 30 minutes past our contract time. Intructional assistants are responsible for all the hall duty that we used to sign up for, and, minute for minute, it works out to be a pretty even swap.

The principal cannot require us to work beyond our contract day, though, and over the years, there has been a breakdown in this shared responsibility. Rumor has it that a few teachers refuse to supervise study hall at all, and that 3 of the 6 teams are only offering it two days a week. That's the issue that I hear will be on the agenda tomorrow. I'll let you know how it all goes down.