Thread: Chicago Teacher's Strike

Originally Posted by ethanwinfield

I don't know what to tell you. I went to the CPS website and searched for public schools serving as close to the same grade levels and number of students. If that's the SCHOOL DAY, it is not 5.5 hours. I randomly selected about 10 different schools out of the 403. The shortest school day I found was 7 hours.

I don't know what to tell you either. I guess it is a media conspiracy or the mayor is lying. Maybe you are looking at the hours after it has been changed, after all they changed it for this school year, that is why they are on strike.

Emanuel said, even scaling back to 7-hour days for elementary schools, CPS will be providing a great deal more classroom time for students, given that the district also lengthened the school year by 10 days starting next school year.

“We are gonna go from 170 days to 180 days; from 5 hours and 45 minutes to 7 hours. That comes to 40 additional days of instruction,” he said.

At the Disney Magnet School on Tuesday, the mayor said: “The [extra] time is not the goal. The time is an opportunity to be maximized for our kids with better instruction.”

The longer elementary school day will include 52 more minutes of instructional time per day, with a total time of six hours in class, and 45 minutes for recess and lunch. High school students will receive 46 more minutes of instructional time per day, the Mayor’s office said.

Emanuel Scales Back Longer School Day ? CBS Chicago

Most kids in Chicago's public schools spend just five hours and 45 minutes in school a day. It's one of the shortest school days in the country.

That's why more than half of the city's public elementary schools have no recess. At those that do, it's shockingly short.

"We have a 10-minute recess and a 10-minute lunch at our school," says Wendy Katten, mother of a third-grader at Burley Elementary School in Chicago. "It's not sufficient."

Chicago Wants Longer School Day; Foes Want Details : NPR