People have been voting on the 2025-26 school calendar choices. County officials are busy working behind the scenes to decide on the dates. The schedule committee is comprised of a representative from each school, and at the moment there are 11 representatives. The committee assembles every other Monday for at least a month and a half. Wheeling Park High School representative Mr. Birch explained what they do to create the schedule options for the students, parents, and staff.
“We review the pros and cons of last year’s calendar using feedback from parents, students, and staff,” said Mr. Birch.
Something parents and students often wonder is why there are so many PL (professional learning) days, and the answer to that is that it is required at least four months out of the year. Additionally, staff will sometimes put in requests for PL Days, such as the day after Halloween. On top of this, as the Ohio County Schools Human Resources Director and Central Office Administrator for the Calendar Committee Susan Nolte says, there are many important topics during PL days.
“For example, the PL Days in October and February are used to review student data from benchmark assessment results at the middle and elementary levels, while the PL Day at the end of winter break is valuable to the high school to prepare for the new semester,” said Nolte.
She also mentioned that a reason for longer winter breaks, depends on when Christmas and New Year’s fall. Like this year it fell on a Wednesday, and made the Winter Break longer than usual. Then with spring break, there were several requests for it to be broken up. So for that option next year, it would mean two four day weekends. Also, if you noticed when seeing the options for next school year, it was a fairly popular request for a later start date.
“Every year we do a survey and get a lot of feedback from our parents and staff. A frequent request that we have received is a start date after Labor Day,” said Nolte.
Although, there have also been some complaints about such a late calendar start.
Counseling Department Chair Mrs. Short, shared her concerns for high schoolers:
- AP test dates are set nationally, and not changed. Starting later gives out students less time to prepare in their AP classes for the tests. WPHS takes great pride in our AP test scores and I would hate to jeopardize that success.
2. I have concerns with students’ attendance rates after Memorial Day holiday passes and the weather breaks.
- Students who work summer jobs, often local parks and day camps will have challenges with scheduling.
- Students who play fall sports will be starting games/matches and will not even have started the school year.
- Seniors have a lot of deadlines with colleges and scholarships. Starting school a couple weeks later could get them started later with these timelines and access to their school counselors and teachers for guidance and support.
All of these conversations throughout the county keep the students’ best interests in mind when deciding on the final calendar for the 25-26 school year.
“Of course no matter the outcome, we will adjust and support our students to get through it,” said Short.
