SE Oakland News

High schools in the Birmingham Public School District may get a schedule change as soon as the 2024-25 school year.

At their March 21 board meeting, the district welcomed Deputy Superintendent Dr. Mark Lineburg to discuss their proposed schedule change. The proposed change, which a committee has worked on for a year, would be to go from a trimester to a semester schedule. The committee has been researching the proposal while collecting feedback from stakeholders in the community. A final plan and recommendation to the board for adoption is scheduled for April.

“They're great. Both (are) great high schools, but there is room for improvement and changing the high school schedule has been talked about for a number of years,” said Lineburg. “I want to stress this has been a committee process and the committee has engaged in tough and difficult dialog. Nothing is easy about changing a high school schedule. There is no perfect high school schedule. That said, we have a team of experts that was on the committee and then you have, between the three of us over 100 years of high school experience, and we've tried the entire time to put our students first as we've as we've gone through this process. So, I really want to stress thanking the high school scheduling committee, we have worked on this for an entire year.”

Birmingham’s current schedule, a five-period day in three trimesters, is the least used schedule by high schools in the area and state. The most common is a six-period, semester-based school day. One of the reasons the district moved to the trimester schedule was due to the 2008 recession and needed to reduce costs, which allowed for a reduction in staffing.

The semester schedule will better align them with other school districts, and with post-secondary education of higher learning. A student survey showed potential interest in semester schedules to allow for better relationship building and academic success, preparation for post-secondary success, but they also conveyed that they desired a manageable schedule.

The committee is recommending that all high schools go to a semester schedule in the 2024-25 school year. While it does decrease the number of courses a student takes each year from 15 to 12 and might reduce some of their elective choices, students will spend more time in their core classes. This should help students better adapt to a college schedule.

Among the concerns of a schedule change are how it will impact the hours of the school day and the implementation of the new schedule change, which the board will work to address at the April meeting.