Earlier this evening, the Haywood County Board of Education made adjustments to the 2019-20 and 2020-21 calendars.  Changes to the 2019-20 calendar were prompted by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Changes to the 2020-21 calendar were prompted by recent legislative action taken by the North Carolina General Assembly.

2019-20 Calendar

Remote student learning will end on Friday, May 29 for Bethel Elementary School, Bethel Middle School, Canton Middle School, Central Haywood High School, Clyde Elementary School, Hazelwood Elementary School, Jonathan Valley Elementary School, Junaluska Elementary School, Meadowbrook Elementary School, North Canton Elementary School, Pisgah High School, Riverbend Elementary School, Tuscola High School, and Waynesville Middle School.  Remote student learning will end on Friday, May 22 for Haywood Early College.

Students are strongly encouraged to remain engaged until remote learning ends.  Students who access remote learning are likely to be better prepared for future learning.  What we learn is more important than short-term numeric or letter grades.  Individual schools will notify students and parents about a number of end-of-year activities in the coming days and weeks.

While some employee work schedules have been flexed, the employee calendar has not changed.  Employees are required to work the Workdays between the last remote learning day and the final contract day.  During this time, schools should practice social distancing while carrying out all regular end-of-year duties and responsibilities (grading and/or feedback on learning, preparing for high school graduation ceremonies, cumulative record purging and completion, helping students collect personal items, collecting and inventorying school supplies, equipment, and materials, preparing classrooms for summer cleaning, sanitizing appropriate items and facilities, etc.).

Principals will notify employees about mandatory and non-mandatory times and activities.  This will vary from campus to campus based upon each school’s size and grade span.  Principals have the authority to start some appropriate end-of-year activities before remote learning ends.

2020-21 Calendar

The North Carolina General Assembly recently passed legislation making changes to 2020-21 school calendars.  This included adding five remote learning days to school calendars and five days of on-site instruction beyond the required 1,025 instructional hours.  Our revised 2020-21 calendars are similar to previous years and meet all of the new legislative requirements.  The newly required remote learning days must be used on existing Workdays.  No additional Workdays were added to the calendar by the state legislature.

Summary Thoughts

We want you to know we are way ahead of the curve, pun intended.  When school buildings were closed, we got to work in a hurry.  No one did remote learning and food distribution better than Haywood County Schools.  The five new state required remote learning days in the 2020-21 calendars will be supplemental.  Teachers will still be able to take these as Optional Workdays and families will still be able to have a few breaks without excessive school work.  We will post the revised calendars on the school system website and share additional remote learning details this summer after our remote learning plan is completed and submitted to the state.  For now, know the 2020-21 calendar days haven’t changed much.

Tomorrow we will share initial information about end-of-year and summer activities.  This will include Phase One orders from the state.  Many of our activities over the coming weeks and months will be impacted by social distancing orders.  We want to, and will, expand planned activities as phased reopening and social distancing permit.

Contact:  Dr. Bill Nolte, Superintendent