Neillsville District Administrator Talks 180 Days Bill, Part 1
Thursday, March 27th, 2014 -- 12:43 PM
-A bill awaiting Governor Scott Walker?s signature would give school districts more flexibility on the number of days required for face-to-face teaching.Neillsville District Administrator John Gaier talked about the current rule schools must follow for face-to-face teaching.
Mr. Gaier said, "Right now, we have to have 180 face-to-face days with students. Along with that, we have to meet a minimum of 1,137 hours for grades 7-12, 1,050 hours for grades 1-6 and 437 hours for Kindergarten. And you have to meet all that criteria. You have to meet both the number of days and the number of hours that are required by the state as of right now. If you don't meet that, the state can withhold general aid. They can penalize you financially if you don't meet the requirements for both hours and the 180 day face-to-face requirement."
This rule has been in effect for decades.
John said, "This has been in effect for decades as far as I know. Certainly for the 18 years I've been superintendent that has been the case; and even prior to that when I was the high school principal, so it has been in place for some time. With no changes."
This new bill would still require all schools to still meet the same number of hours Mr. Gaier mentioned, but they would not need to have 180 days of teaching.
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