Drama instructor Kate Booth took 12 Christopher High School students in October to the world-renowned Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Ore.
Her students saw four plays, attended two question and answer sessions with professional actors, toured three theaters and explored the Southern Oregon University campus.
Booth insists the experience is integral to the core standards of her curriculum. But the fact it caused her and her students to miss an entire Friday of classes hatches much ado with the school board.
With five instructional days axed from the 2011-12 school year – not to mention a rumored possible 15 days that could be eliminated next year due to massive state budget cuts – the district’s field trip policy is in the spotlight as trustees discuss limiting the number of instructional days a student can miss for certain types of outings. The concern has surfaced several times this year and was agendized for discussion during Thursday’s school board meeting at district offices.
“No one is saying all field trips are bad. I’m absolutely not,” said Trustee Mark Good. He underlined the critical components of a well-rounded education, which includes activities related to arts and music.
But with instructional days going out the window alongside a possible $3.5 to $8.5 million in education funding, the Gilroy School Board is analyzing its protocol for gauging the “gray areas” between academic, extra-curricular and competitive field trips that cause students to miss school.
In this respect, “we’re going to have to make some tough decisions,” said Good.
When teachers accompany their students on field trips, additionally, “they’re not there to teach their class,” said GUSD Superintendent Debbie Flores. “And that’s been a concern.”
Trustees are primarily focusing on high school field trips, according to Flores, versus trips taken in elementary and junior high schools. When an elementary schools’ entire fourth grade visits Mission San Juan Bautista, for example, “that’s different than a high school field trip for English students who are going to miss four other periods of instruction,” she said.
In the 2011-12 year, there were approximately 182 approved field trips, according to GUSD data. Of those, about 50 were for CHS, Gilroy High School or the Dr. TJ Owens Gilroy Early College Academy (GECA). GUSD’s daily substitute rate is $120, or $135.95 when statutory benefits are factored in.
Prior to Thursday’s meeting, Trustee Fred Tovar said he wants to see the district set a cap for the number of school days students can miss due to field trips. What that figure is, and how it will apply to different types of field trips is on the table for discussion.
A few high school teachers taking advantage of real-life, off-campus learning opportunities find this disheartening.
“I wish the school board would recognize that this is not lost instructional time. It’s alternate instructional time,” said Booth. “Students are being given an experience they simply can’t gain in the classroom.”
That’s exactly how Heather Nolan, a science teacher and agriculture adviser at Gilroy High School, feels about a four-day state leadership conference she and Future Farmers of America students attend yearly in the spring. Nolan said her students get first-hand experience in public speaking, interact with other students succeeding in FFA programs and spend an entire day on the Fresno State campus. They participate in college workshops and visit representatives from various universities such as Purdue, Cornell and UC Davis.
For the Fresno conference, FFA students will depart Saturday, April 21 and miss the following Monday and Tuesday. By the end of this year, Nolan will have taken her students on a total of 10 trips – several of which occur during the week.
“It is unsettling. It makes me really nervous, actually,” she said, at the thought of seeing her students miss out on valuable opportunities that promote learning and inspire career aspirations. “Unless (trustees) actually went on the field trip, they’re not going to understand the value of it. I can explain it until I’m blue in the face, but if you’ve never seen or experienced it, you have no idea.”
Athletic absences vs. field trips: ‘Discrimination?’
Studying district field trip policy segues to another touchy subject; something Booth characterizes as “field trip discrimination.”
The issue of student-athletes leaving their fifth and sixth period classes to get ready for competition and to attend sports-related activities is so frequent, Booth began keeping a binder to track and document how often it happens.
Why?
“I want them to approve my stinkin’ field trip,” she laughed. “I don’t know why (sports-related absences) are unquestionably OK, but the rest of us have to ask for special permission and hope that they see the value in what we’re doing.”
Her drama students missed 335 minutes of class time Friday for the Shakespeare festival, for example, “but we had 952 instructional minutes throughout the field trip,” Booth noted.
In that same month (October), Booth calculated student-athletes who missed her classes for games or sports-related activities totaled 1,821 minutes – “only they didn’t gain instructional minutes,” she added.
Phil Robb, long-time district choral director who is accustomed to student-athletes leaving his classes a half-hour early to get ready for games, was also quick to highlight this issue. Athletes can miss classes “and there’s no repercussions for it,” he noted. “There is no consideration for the fact that kids will miss a lot of school time for different sports, but if it’s the choir kids that are missing class, then we get all kinds of grief.”
Booth, Robb and Nolan were quick to reiterate: They’re not against sports. Nolan coined athletics as one of the “carrots” that encourages kids to keep their grades up so they can be eligible to participate.
Still, Booth wants out-of-school educational activities to be given equal, if not higher priority.
And thus the quandary, says CHS Principal John Perales. In reality, athletes miss “a lot of school,” he said. Finding a way to mitigate lost classroom time – which begs the sensitive task of having to assign importance to one field trip over another – “is really tough,” said Perales.
“The way I see it is, academic time is academic time is academic time,” he continued. “I struggle with this question myself. It is an issue that needs to be addressed and there needs to be some guidance there.”
Perales said CHS Athletic Director Darren Yafai emails a list to every teacher Sunday night with the names of athletes who need to be released early that week. Teachers are then reminded again daily via email of which students will have to leave class early. Yafai said it’s important to note that CHS has two sixth period athletic training classes, which are currently full and open to athletes only. CHS athletes also have “significantly higher” grades and attendance rates than many students who aren’t involved in sports, he added.
When asked to respond to Booth’s concerns, Trustee Tovar emphatically expressed his appreciation for educational field trips. However, he wants to see greater emphasis on finding off-campus learning opportunities that are closer to home. Tovar also voiced concern for students who might have trouble coughing up the money for out-of-town field trips.
For example, “why go to an art show in New York when we may have one in say, downtown San Jose, where it’s closer, won’t be as expensive and won’t cause students to miss any days?” he said, painting a theoretical scenario.
For Robb, whose choir is a recognizable, melodious force who make a handful of off-campus appearances for civic club performances and competitions, some learning experiences simply can’t be replaced.
In the three instructional days his top chamber choir singers missed this year, they were exposed to a “plethora of instruction” from 14 top U.S. college choral conductors – “but heaven forbid you should go outside of the classroom and learn anything,” Robb joked.
Superintendent Flores pointed out that field trips do not come as an expense to the district’s general fund; rather, outings are paid for through parent and club fundraisers. The district does not lose ADA (state funding per average daily attending student) when students go on field trips.
The school site principal, followed by the district office, must approve all field trips. Out of state/overnight trips must be approved by the School Board.
As for Senior Grad Night to Disneyland, a “culminating experience of four years in high school,” Flores said this trip is not under any scrutiny.
The board’s review of field trip policy is not related to the drunk driving incident that occurred in April 2011, when former GHS track and field coach Alvin Harrison crashed a school-rented van while driving to a track meet in Southern California, according to Flores. Harrison was arrested on DUI charges and for driving without a valid drivers’ license.
Of the 50 high school field trips taken this year, “you’ll be pretty hard-pressed to find many that aren’t education-related,” said Booth. “We’re educators. I wish that there was a little bit of faith in us. Let us do what we’re doing and stop micro-managing.”
This story was completed prior to Thursday’s School Board meeting. Check online at gilroydispatch.com for new developments.
– Kindergarten: Uesugi Farms Pumpkin Patch
– Kindergarten: Las Animas Fire Station
– Second grade: Santa Cruz County Fair
– Second grade: San Jose Tech Museum
– All fourth grades: San Juan Bautista Mission
– Fifth grade: Stanford Arts Center
– Fifth grade: Moss Landing Harbor District
– Numerous K-12 grades: The Monterey Bay Aquarium
– CHS: Oregon Shakespeare Festival
– GHS FFA students: Greenhand Leadership Conference
– GHS FFA students: Fresno State Leadership Conference
– GHS/CHS choir students: American Choral Director Honor Choir in Reno, NV
– CHS: Museum of Tolerance/University of California, Los Angeles/Long Beach State College
– Total field trips for 2011-12: 182
