No End In Sight For Andover Schools Start Times Process

ANDOVER, MA — There's a long way to go in the quest to potentially set new start times for Andover's public schools, school committee members said at their meeting Tuesday. A transportation study, which they had hoped would give options to compress the range of pick-up and drop-off times across the grades, was not complete, and committee Chairman Joel Blumstein said he was not sure if it would be for the next meeting, Nov. 21. The analysis, by bus routing software company edulog, has been expanded to explore more variations, committee members said.

Initial results of the study showed some ideas for making the decision easier may be too complex, officials said. For example, "b runs," the double runs some buses make on the same route, might be more difficult to eliminate than they thought. And requirements that they transport over 100 students to the town's private schools means they have more to worry about than the district's bell times.

"We've learned much in the last several weeks of the process. We've come to appreciate the tremendous value the double runs have in efficiency," said Assistant Superintendent Sandra Trach. "Edulog's initial analysis has stretched to study variations on a number of scenarios."

"I don't feel comfortable picking a specific date" for a decision, Blumstein said. "After we get the Edulog report, I'm hoping we'll form some type of advisory group with parents and potentially others ... It might be helpful."

Edulog is studying what it would take to get rid of b runs, alongside variations on the status quo and the proposed no-cost "flip" and "shift" options. After strong push back from elementary school parents, Blumstein said at the last commitee meeting that he "couldn't see" 6:33 a.m. elementary school bus pickups happening, as would happen if elementary school and middle/high school start times were flipped with no other changes happening.

"I think the other thing that's been more clear to me is how long a process this may be," said committee member Paul Murphy. "It's so complex and it does involve far more constituencies and stakeholders than maybe we thought at the beginning."

Several elementary school parents again used the public comment period to urge the committee to take young kids more into account in whatever decision they make, but not in the same numbers as at recent meetings.

Superintendent Dr. Sheldon Berman also said that in addition to start times, the administration has been talking about making changes at the high school level to give students more meaningful homework and less busywork.

The committee also approved next year's school calendar, with school in session for Good Friday and Yom Kippur, and gave conditional approval to a new Special Education Parent Advisory Council.

Christopher Huffaker: 412-265-8353 or chris.huffaker@patch.com.