Schools eliminate early release days, move to half days

Many parents of school-age children in town have found themselves scrambling to figure out what time their students will be released from school. For years, there have been early release days and half days on the calendar, leading to tricky after-school planning for parents and caregivers. The School Committee decided that for this academic year, and likely those going forward, there will be just one shortened school day to keep track of, the half day.

Citing parent and teacher discontent, School Superintendent Linda Dwight said the move to eliminate early release days and move to half days will solve many problems at once. According to Dwight, parents have expressed confusion and frustration with the inconsistencies for years. There were 18 early release or half days during the 2023-24 academic year. Students at the Bromfield School would be dismissed at 12:36 p.m. on an early release day and 11:20 a.m. on a half day. At Hildreth Elementary School, early release dismissal time was at 1:35 p.m. and a half day was at 12:15 p.m. To further complicate matters, lunch was not served at Bromfield on either day, while HES students ate lunch at school on early release days but not on half days.

Making the move to eliminate early release days allowed the schools to avoid confusion about dismissal times and whether lunch would be served. There will now be just 11 half days during the current school year. According to Dwight, this works for students, faculty, and staff by providing more classroom hours and giving professionals the time they require for development and collaboration.

“What we decided to do was gain more time [for professional development],” said Dwight during an interview with the Press in which half was conducted outdoors during a scheduled fire drill. “But to have fewer of them and to be consistent for families. They’re all half days, which gives us more time, but there’s only 11 of them. It seems to be a win-win.”

Another change approved by the School Committee was to set the calendar for two years, as opposed to one, as was done in the past. This will allow families planning extended vacations to have visibility into the schools’ plans. Additionally, the graduation date was added to the calendar as well as the last day of school.

“We denote the snow days a little bit differently,” said Dwight. “That was always very confusing. The state of Massachusetts requires us to build in five [snow days].” Now the last day of school is marked on the calendar, June 16, but that week is grayed out, indicating that the last days of school are not set in stone. “We will reissue it after a snow day happens,” said Dwight.