Revised School Calendar Discussed

Like every other school board in the Farmington Valley, the Granby Board of Education is wrangling with how to make up the time lost from school cancellations due to the massive power outages that cost the district six class days.

At its regular meeting Wednesday, the board discussed, without making a final decision, converting the two vacation days on Feb. 20 and 21 into school days, and adding four days onto the end of the school year.

The school board discussed leaving spring break in April unscathed for the moment, though, as Chairman Cal Heminway said, if there is a snowy winter, “Everything is back on the table.”

“We’re doing everything we can to preserve April break,” Heminway said.

If the school board implements its plan, and there are no additional snow days (an unlikely proposition, given the events over the last year), then the last day of school would be pushed back from June 7 to the 13th.

O’Connor resigns

In other business, school board member John O’Connor announced his resignation, effective after the Dec. 7 meeting.

O’Connor’s resignation marks additional change to the board, as Ron Walther and Marie Nicholls did not seek re-election and will be replaced by Lynn Guelzow and Jenny Emery.

“We will miss you,” Heminway said to O’Connor.

Bullying policy read into record

The school board also read into the record an revised bullying policy to reflect a recent anti-bullying statute passed by the state legislature that recently went into effect.

School board members said that the new policy is broad-based and can lead to unintended consequences.

Ed Ohannessian said that there is no mechanism in the statute that removes the label of a bully once it is applied.

Contract ratified

The school board also ratified the Granby Educators Association’s three-year contract that will run from July 1, 2012 through June 30, 2015. Check in with Patch for further details on the agreement.