Election Day Could Become School Holiday in Palm Beach County

By Marc Freeman, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Jan. 23–Election Day could become a day off for Palm Beach County students and teachers as a measure to heighten school safety — and students could get a civics lesson as well.

A school district proposal would cancel classes when voters cast ballots for president on Nov. 4, 2008, and again on Nov. 2, 2010, for the Florida gubernatorial contest. All schools, including those with polling places, would remain open for primaries and other elections.

“What a great learning experience,” said Joseph Cominio, a seventh-grade civics teacher in Palm Beach Gardens who recently taught his students about the 26th Amendment, which gave 18-year-olds the right to vote.

“The kids will see [the Election Day holiday] as something important happening that day.”

The proposed change is one of the highlights of school calendars planned for the next four years. Administrators and volunteers recently drafted the 180-day planners, despite uncertainty about whether state legislators this spring will modify a year-old law regulating school start dates and pass legislation prohibiting classes on Veterans Day.

On Feb. 7, the Palm Beach County School Board will vote on a calendar for the 2007-08 school year. The first day of school this year would be Aug. 22, and the last day would be June 6, 2008.

One of the biggest changes from recent years will be to schedule end-of-semester exams for middle and high school students on Jan.14-17, 2008, after the two-week Winter Break. Many educators and parents prefer having the exams before the vacation, but that became difficult because of the late August start.

A full version of the proposed calendar is available on the district’s Web site, www.palmbeachschools.org. The board will consider calendars for the 2008 to 2011 school years at a future meeting.

Parents can tentatively plan for first days of school on: Aug. 20, 2008; Aug. 25, 2009; and Aug. 23, 2010.

The Aug. 22, 2007, opening is the latest for local schools in more than a decade, because of the new law that bars school from starting more than 14 days before Labor Day on Sept. 3.

But on Wednesday, the state Senate’s pre-K-12 committee will discuss exceptions to the late start law when it reviews a bill submitted by Bill Posey, R-Rockledge.

If the legislation succeeds, schools this year could open earlier in August if they offered Advanced Placement classes or dual enrollment with a college, or operate a year-round education program.

A coalition of Central Florida school districts also has been discussing strategies to get rid of the later start.

In response, a grass-roots group called Save Our Summers-Florida is lobbying legislators to keep in place the law they fought for last year.

Meanwhile, state senators also could review a bill concerning Veterans Day observances that would force public schools to close on the federal holiday held each Nov. 11.

Sparking a protest by local veterans, Palm Beach County schools were in session on Veterans Day in 2005 because it was a hurricane makeup day.

The holiday fell on a Saturday last year and is on a Sunday this year.

Schools would be open on Veterans Day in 2008 and 2010 since Election Day would become a holiday for students and teachers, said Russ Feldman, district special education executive director and head of a committee that developed the draft calendars. Schools would be closed for Veterans Day in 2009.

Theo Harris, president of the Palm Beach County Classroom Teachers Association, says his union won’t oppose the Election Day change.

Local elections officials and politicians have often asked that schools be closed on election days, because about 75 of the 164 campuses host polling places.

Major contests typically crowd school parking lots and invite strangers inside.

Advocates for closing schools say in addition to improving safety, it’s an opportunity to increase voter turnout, help poll-worker recruiting, add new precincts and teach kids the importance of the right to vote.

At least six states and many counties across the country close schools on major election days.

But Kenneth Trump, president of a school-security consulting firm based in Cleveland, Ohio, recommends removing polling places from schools, instead of canceling classes.

“It’s absolutely amazing that schools spend millions if not billions of dollars on security measures, only to open up the door to anyone who comes to vote,” he said, adding that elected officials have been reluctant to stop polling at schools because it could be considered unpopular.

If polling places remain, then schools should be closed to students on Election Day as a “risk reduction measure,” said Trump, of National School Safety and Security Services.

Officials also should impose tight security restrictions at school polling places, including requiring voters to enter and leave a designated voting area without going through the rest of the school building, he said.

Marc Freeman can be reached at mjfreeman@sun-sentinel.com or 561-243-6642.

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Copyright (c) 2007, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

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