>La Grande Observer | Union and Wallowa Counties' News Leader

ELGIN — Days will soon be getting longer and weeks shorter in the Elgin School District.

The Elgin School Board voted 5-0 Thursday night to switch to a four-day week starting in 2008-09. The Elgin School District is presently on a 4 1/2-day week and has been for several years. Students attend school half a day on Friday.

The switch will save the district about $18,000 a year because of reduced bus expenses. The cost savings is not the primary reason the district is making the switch, though.

The move is being made to allow teachers greater stretches of uninterrupted time with their students. The four-day week will allow the district to let athletic teams compete only on Friday and Saturday except under special circumstances, so that the focus will be on academics during the four-day week.

“The key will be protecting our class time Monday through Thursday at all costs,’’ said Elgin Superintendent Larry Glaze.

Presently, students are missing large blocks of class time because they have to leave school early to travel to athletic competitions. One reason is that all of the schools in Elgin’s conference are on four-day weeks.

Conference rivals thus schedule many athletic competitions for early Friday, conflicting with Elgin’s class time on Fridays.

Every school district in Union and Wallowa counties will now be on a four-day week except Imbler and La Grande. Imbler has a 4.5-day week and

La Grande has a 5-day week. Glaze said that student academic test scores in area districts that have switched to four-day weeks have remained the same.

Elgin students will be in class as long as they are now because the school day will be lengthened to make up for the lost half-day on Friday. Teachers will be paid the same amount because class time will not be lost. Also, every effort will be made to prevent classified staff employees, including cooks and secretaries, from having hours cut. Board member Bud Scoubes stipulated in his motion that every attempt be made to prevent classified employees from losing any work hours.

“It will be important to be flexible,’’ Scoubes said.

The school board made its decision after hearing a report from Melissa Bonanno, an Elgin middle school language arts teacher. Bonanno and other Elgin teachers visited the Wallowa School District earlier to learn about how its switch to a four-day week several years ago went. Bonanno told the board that Wallowa’s teachers and everyone they talked to in the community said the move has benefited the district and its students.

Elgin’s teachers overwhelmingly support the move, said Glaze. He noted, though, that there will be people who will oppose the switch.

“There are always people in the community who resist change,’’ Glaze said.

The superintendent said that “once school districts go to a four-day week they never go back (to a 4 1/2 or 5-day week).’’

Scoubes said that success of the four-day week in area school districts is an excellent reason to make the switch.

“We are not reinventing anything. It should be an easy transition because of all the lessons learned (by other school districts).’’