WHMS students raise their voices to reinstate music

While most students typically can’t wait for the school bell to ring, West Hempstead Middle and High School students have started to hear that bell ringing earlier this year due to the district’s conversion from a 9-period to an 8-period schedule at the expense of cutting time from their electives.

As a result of the district’s new $55.6 million spending plan, WHMS teachers and students spoke out against this shrinkage of the school’s daily schedule for both schools — which included the consolidation of 7th grade lunch and music classes into one period — at the Sept. 17 board meeting.

“Music is a creative outlet for students to express themselves, and with art gone, it’s the only thing we have left to do it in,” said Darien Lombardo, a 7th grader who represented his classmates at the meeting. “We have a really strong music department in our school and district — it’s a shame to see kids drop music and then not get the experience through middle school, high school and even after.”

This year’s 7th grade schedule, according to Assistant Superintendent Ann Peluso, still features seven periods of state required courses, but now involves half an hour of music — 15 minutes less than the full period students had every other day for half a year — and up to 15 minutes of lunch. While other elective courses, such as home economics and technology, have retained their full period status for 7th graders, WHMS students in 6th and 8th grade are still enrolled in the music program for a regular 46-minute period.

“The schedules haven’t changed significantly at all — what we had to do was take all the requirements and make sure we fit them into an 8-period day,” Superintendent John Hogan later told the Herald. “We looked at 6th, 7th and 8th grades and had to make sure we made all the right adjustments over those three years.”

Despite these program cuts for middle and high school students, Peluso said that the district has added five minutes to other school periods in their schedule, increasing instruction time for both students and teachers.

While she may now have more time teaching her students, Barbara Hafner — Union President and 6th grade teacher at WHMS — said at the board meeting that she can no longer spend time preparing the Common Core math program with her colleagues during her professional period after the elimination of 9th period.

“This year, we don’t have time to sit together and look at this brand new math program,” Hafner added. “We have a long way to go before the budget is created — you need to rethink this and how we’re going to provide the time needed to do the things we want to do for our students.”

In order to avoid piercing the tax cap levy — which currently sits below 3.55 percent, the state’s limit for the district — Deputy Superintendent Richard Cunningham said that the .88 percent increase for the 2013-14 budget, along with a hike in teachers’ health and retirement plans, prompted the district to reduce the cost of its schools’ operation, starting with several staff cuts.

In the restoration of $400,000 in state aid, Cunningham said that the district managed to restore two secondary teaching positions and one elementary position — still letting go 8 full-time teachers and one part-time teacher at the secondary level — in time for a record enrollment of students at the start of this year.

“We needed to increase staff without reducing class size, so we had to reduce our offerings,” Cunningham said.

Cunningham added that the district is currently seeking to invest in creative ideas that will generate revenue aside from taxes and state aid, such as leasing the high school roof to solar electricity companies for the installation of solar panels and developing a “request for proposal” to bring business ideas into the public library.

“We’re trying to be fiscally prudent, while at the same time, hold onto all our programs and it’s become increasingly difficult,” Superintendent Hogan said. “The schedules for this school year will remain in place — when we go through the budget process, we’re going to have to see if we can restore the 9-period day.”