Legislators are supporting bills that would broaden the definition of school instruction beyond "seat time" but would also standardize bell schedules to ensure that the length of the school day is about the same for students statewide.
Under measures before the state House and Senate, the Department of Education would devise up to four bell schedule options each for elementary, middle and high schools. All public schools would have to move to one of the standardized schedules by the 2014-15 school year.
Public charter and multitrack schools would be exempt.
The bills would give schools more discretion in how they define instructional time, as part of a push locally and nationally to reconsider what constitutes learning and include experiences outside the classrooms, such as project-based activities, after-school sports, academic clubs and even recess.
"Instruction and teachable moments occur, just like with adults, in many, many different ways," said state Rep. Roy Takumi, House Education chairman. "Whatever the means, we should only care about that goal" of student learning.
At the same time, lawmakers and advocates say setting minimums for instructional time is important and that standardizing bell schedules will address significant differences in the length of the school day from campus to campus.
A recent DOE report found the amount of instructional time Hawaii’s secondary students receive varies widely depending on where they live, from a little more than four hours to more than five hours per day on average.
"What we saw as a result of the report is that you had hundreds of bell schedules throughout the system," said state Sen. Jill Tokuda, chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee. "All those flexibilities were getting in the way."
Standardizing bell schedules, she added, "isn’t about eliminating choice … (but rather) trying to come up with some level of consistency" in the length of the day.
The teachers union has raised concerns about mandating standardized schedules in state law, however, and said the issue should be left to collective bargaining. Currently, schools that want to modify their bell schedules must put the change up for a vote by teachers. Under the teachers’ contract, a new bell schedule is adopted if two-thirds of teachers on a school campus approve it.
Wil Okabe, Hawaii State Teachers Association president, told the Legislature earlier this month that standardized bell schedules might be difficult to put in place. Different bell schedules, he said, take into account a school’s needs.
"We acknowledge the intent to provide equal opportunity and access to students … and we support that effort," Okabe said in testimony. "Let us work together to create what works for students, teachers and schools."
The state Department of Education supports standardized schedules. Schools Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi said the change would allow for "coordinated planning and learning opportunities."
The discussion on lengthening the school day in the islands first gained momentum after teacher furlough days in the 2009-10 school year gave Hawaii schoolchildren the shortest instructional calendar in the nation.
Under a law passed last year, which amended a more ambitious timeline approved the year before, half of the state’s elementary schools had to offer at least five hours and five minutes of instructional time on average each day this school year. The DOE met that mandate, with 72 percent of schools hitting the minimum. By the coming school year, all elementary schools must meet it.
And by 2014 all middle and high schools will have to offer at least 51⁄2 hours on average each day. Charter and multitrack schools are exempted from the law, which also calls for a school year of at least 180 instructional days.
The law further requires all public schools to increase the amount of instructional time offered to at least six hours on average per day by 2016, but lawmakers want to do away with that requirement, given budget restraints.
Takumi said the goal of offering six hours of instructional time per day is noble but probably unrealistic and "very difficult to achieve without additional dollars." He added that "down the road you could easily reinstate it."
Lawmakers say they are more interested in broadening the definition of instructional time to include learning that happens outside the classroom or in nontraditional ways, such as through an online class students can work through at their own pace. They say this effort is critical to consider as online and project-based learning opportunities increase in schools statewide.
The measures before legislators define instructional time as classroom, project-based and technology-assisted learning but open the door to counting after-school sports and clubs and even recess.
Melanie Bailey, a strong advocate for lengthening the school day, said she doesn’t think the state should abandon the goal of bringing the average instructional day to six hours, but supports the broader goal of defining instructional time to include learning that doesn’t take place in a class.
"We really do need to redefine what is instruction because the world is changing, and we can’t do things how we did them 50 years ago," Bailey said. "The way our kids are learning is different than the way we learned."