eNews: April 12, 2023
In This Edition:
1. Twelve-Month Employee Leave Policy = 17,856 Missing Working Days
2. Arlington Non-Profit Tackles Literacy Crisis
4. Civic Federation Hosts Candidate Forum
3. New Precalculus Leaves Out 25% of Content
4. Your APS Student Progress Dashboard Questions Answered
5. Sixty Percent of Street Pills Laced with Deadly Fentanyl
6. Happening Soon
Twelve-Month Employee Leave Policy =
17,856 Missing Working Days
In order to calculate the impacts of APS’ recent change to the leave policy of twelve-month employees, APE sent in a FOIA request to see how many twelve-month employees work for the district. According to the FOIA, APS employs 992 twelve-month employees.
Last year, these twelve-month employees were given eighteen more paid holidays on top of their previous thirteen, for a total of 31 days, by Superintendent Durán without a vote of the School Board. These days are in addition to annual leave that they separately accrue, where twelve-month employees receive a minimum of fourteen annual days and accrue an additional day of leave per each year of service. In contrast, teachers and other ten-month employees are not paid for any of these holidays because these days are not included in their 200-day contracts. Ten-month employees also accrue less annual leave than twelve-month employees.
Why This Matters:
To put the impact of the new paid-holiday policy into context, eighteen additional paid holidays for 992 twelve-month employees is the equivalent of 17,856 work days per school year, or just over 71 twelve-month employees, assuming a standard 250 work days.
Further, does this policy change create a future financial liability for APS? Per APS policy, eligible APS employees can cash out accrued leave. If an employee does not have to take off any time during winter break or spring break, they can instead bank their accrued leave.
This imposes monetary costs on APS (e.g. APS reversed its paid-leave policy in 2018 in order to save $500,000). It is calculable, and APE has previously asked APS to estimate the cost of this new policy. APS should be transparent about this and the tradeoffs that are being made to continue this inherently unfair and costly benefit, which far exceeds leave policies for most state and federal employees. APS should also address the non-monetary, disparate impacts of this policy on ten-month employees' morale and operations, such as the effects to the timeline required to onboard and recruit substitutes and inaccessible administrative offices due to Syphax closures during school days off.
Arlington Non-Profit Tackles Literacy Crisis
Aspire! is an afterschool learning program working to expand learning opportunities to help historically underserved 3rd through 8th grade students in South Arlington fulfill their potential through afterschool and summer learning programs. Aspire is committed to closing the opportunity gap and offers its programs at no cost to families. APE strongly supports this organization and its efforts to address the literacy crisis. We encourage you to:
Sign up for an upcoming volunteer night and dedicate an hour of your time to read with their students.
Share Aspire’s new website with others and invite them to learn more about Aspire’s programs.
Financially support Aspire to help increase opportunities and close the literacy gap in Arlington!
Civic Federation Hosts School Board
Candidate Forum
As a member organization of the Arlington Civic Federation, we wanted to share a video of the forum they hosted yesterday evening with current candidates running for Arlington County Board and Arlington School Board (1:26). Watch here.
Submit a question for our questionnaire for the Arlington Democratic Committee's School Board endorsement candidates.
New Precalculus Leaves Out 25% of Content
APS will begin offering AP Precalculus next fall. While the course was created to “prepare a much broader group of students to thrive in college math courses,” it has been mired in controversy. While lauded by many equity advocates, math reformers disliked AP Precalculus, fearing it could undermine their effort to shift students away from the calculus pathway.
Math reformers asked the College Board to reduce the content of AP Precalculus and shortly thereafter the College Board cut back the exam content by 25%. The majority of the exam now focuses on Algebra II concepts with more challenging precalculus concepts relegated to an optional section. Given the reduction in rigor, it is unsurprising that the College Board noted that “every student ready for Precalculus is ready for AP Precalculus” and that they expect that “most students will take AP Precalculus as seniors” (Video 1 Slide 10:18). They also encouraged districts NOT to restrict access to AP Precalculus to just honors students (Video 117:15). For these reasons, AP Precalculus is a better match for regular Precalculus students rather than Intensified Precalculus students.
Why It Matters
Contrary to the College Board’s advice, APS replaced Intensified Precalculus with AP Precalculus and is continuing to offer non-intensified Precalculus. This decision serves no one: Intensified Precalculus students need a more rigorous course to prepare them for calculus (and STEM careers) and regular Precalculus students are being denied an opportunity to earn AP math credits. For SY 2024-25 and beyond, we ask that APS bring back Intensified Precalculus and replace non-intensified, regular Precalculus with AP Precalculus instead.
Your APS Student Progress Dashboard
Questions Answered
We wanted to repost our article on how to use the APS Student Progress Dashboard. APS has put out an excellent, user-friendly resource which aggregates student assessment data so that administrators and parents alike can monitor and track school- and system-wide progress in bringing our students up to grade level academically. This is an important step towards transparency and accountability and we commend APS for the hard work it took to make this dashboard possible.
Here’s an overview of how to navigate the new dashboard yourself:
The tabs titled "Trend by Test Administration" and "Division/School Comparison" show assessment results from the fall or "beginning of year" (BOY), from the winter or "middle of year" (MOY), and from the spring or "end of year" (EOY). Users may select data by school, school year, and grade level. Results are shown for all students and by race/ethnicity, disability status (called Students with Disabilities or SWD), status as an English Learner (EL). Among students learning English, scores can also be sorted by level of English proficiency (called English Learners by Proficiency or ELP). The Division/School Comparison function presents data side-by-side for the entire district as well as for an individual school a user has selected.
"School Year Comparison" presents year-over-year data for three years. The notes indicate that reported results are calculated based on each student’s highest level of performance over the entire school year. Both "Overview by Test Administration" and "Overview by School Year" show the raw numbers of students who took the assessments (not just percentages). "Overview by Test Administration" allows a user to select fall, winter, or spring assessments, while "Overview by School Year" reports the highest level of performance per school year.
Sixty Percent of Street Pills Laced with
Deadly Fentanyl
The DEA is seeking to educate parents and children about the dangers of fentanyl. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is used to treat pain. It is up to 50 times stronger than heroin and 100 times stronger than morphine. A trace amount can kill a person. Even more troubling, it can be found in substances like counterfeit pills, including stimulants, sedatives, methamphetamines, heroin and cocaine. As a result, many people may not know they're ingesting fentanyl, leading to accidental poisoning.
The DEA Laboratory has found that, of the fentanyl-laced fake prescription pills analyzed in 2022, six out of ten now contain a potentially lethal dose of fentanyl. This is a dramatic 50% increase from 2021, when the DEA found that four out of ten fentanyl-laced fake prescription pills were found to contain a potentially lethal dose. Every parent should speak to his or her children about the risks of fentanyl and pills not obtained through a pharmacy. The DEA's "One Pill Can Kill" campaign has excellent resources on the issue, such as this publication.
Happening Soon
Wednesday April 12 7:00 PM: Arlington Democratic Committee Monthly Meeting with School Board Candidate Announcements, Drew Elementary and Live Stream
Thursday April 13 7:00 PM: School Board Meeting, Syphax Board Room 256-258
Saturday April 15 9:30 AM: Arlington Democratic Committee "Second Saturday Breakfast" with School Board Candidate Forum, Busboys & Poets in Shirlington
Tuesday April 18 6:30 PM: Budget Work Session #5
Thursday April 20 - 23: Central Library, Friends of the Arlington Public Library Book Sale (Teachers and librarians with school ID's receive 50% off book purchases on Friday and Saturday, and everyone receives 50% off on Sunday)
Thursday April 27 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM: Arlington Reads Event "Get Graphic," Presenting Graphic Novelist Jerry Craft.
Thursday May 4 5:30 PM: Budget Work Session #6 – NEW DATE AND TIME
Thursday May 4 6:00 PM - 8:00 PM: Arlington Reads Event "Get Graphic," Presenting Graphic Novelist Gene Luen Yang.
For more info on the library events, contact Anneliesa Alprin of the Arlington Public Library.
Did you know you can add the APS calendar to your iphone calendar or google calendar? Check it out!
March 30th School Board Meeting
Here are our Top Four Takeaways from the March 30th School Board meeting:
Arlington Education Association (AEA) filed a request seeking certification to be the exclusive representative for licensed personnel and support personnel.
New Content Filter is being installed on APS Devices.
The Board voiced concerns, which have been echoed by the community, about the use of $40 million of reserve funds for ongoing costs.
Chair Goldstein commented that the Board is still working through a lot of issues on the budget proposal. In the past, the School Board’s Proposed Budget is usually a good indicator of what the final budget will be, but that may not be the case this year.
Why It Matters:
The budget for the upcoming fiscal year is under development and your feedback is vital. Email the School Board your thoughts on the budget as it moves towards the final vote.
Read the full recap.
