Each year at this time, school districts set out to devise a school calendar for the coming school year. You may think to yourself, what is the big deal about devising a school calendar?

The process is very difficult and takes a great deal of input and consideration. Consider this, if San Saba ISD has approximately 700 students, multiply that by 2 parents who work two different jobs and have very regimented schedules, then that is 1400 adults who will be impacted by the school calendar. Not to mention our community, our businesses, and grandparents to attend school functions. For this very reason, we put a great deal of thought in to the construction of the calendar. The most important part of devising a school calendar is to set a calendar that will produce the maximum academic learning possible for our students. We must consider testing dates, sports events, holidays and local events such as stock shows.

Basically, school districts operate from 170 - 180 instructional days for students. San Saba ISD is studying the possibility of operating an optional flexible year calendar. What this means is that we would use the 10 days between 170 instructional days minimum and 180 instructional days maximum to provide 1 to 1 tutoring and small group instruction to the students in jeopardy of failing and non-promotion.

The optional flexible year calendar is a new option provided by the Texas Education Agency and has been used by several school districts in our proximity; namely, Comanche ISD and Mason ISD with great success.

We have introduced this concept to our staff and will be working to determine a calendar soon. Our next step is to send proposed calendars to the staff for input, present the options to the District Site-Based Decision Making Committee and then final adoption by the SSISD School Board of Trustees.

The optional flexible year calendar would offer an incentive to students to pass the TAKS test, to have high attendance and to pass all of their classes, as having the opportunity to miss 10 days of school will be opportunity if students perform well in these areas.

Please watch the SSISD website as options for the proposed 2009-2010 calendar will be posted in the very near future. Please do not hesitate to give me a call if you have any question or would like to offer a suggestion about the school calendar.

Please remember that our website is the key to keeping up-to-date on school happenings. Please visit www.san-saba.net to view events and find information you need to know about SSISD.

Basketball is in full swing! Please try to make it to a 7/8 grade game at the White gym on Monday nights, or catch a game at Armadillo Arena on Tuesday or Friday nights.

If you have any questions about this article or any other question about school happenings please contact me at 325/372-3144.