Over the past two years, the Twin Falls School District has been exploring ways to enhance the effectiveness of instruction so that all students in our district receive a world-class education. In order to address this challenge, a committee was formed, made up of both parents and teachers representing all levels within our school system. More time for teacher collaboration and professional development was identified as an area where we could make some improvements.

Currently, each school works to set aside time for teachers to take on the many tasks that are outside of the normal classroom instruction. Teachers are tasked with grading, attending staff meetings, preparing lessons, collaborating with other teachers in the same grade to make sure they are using the best practices, collaborating with teachers in the grades above and below them to make sure the students’ education is seamless, and continually learning to improve their craft. This seems like a lot!  It is critical that teachers have time for intentional planning where they can collaborate with grade level/subject area teams or across grade levels and well as time for teachers to receive training. In order to make time for this, the district began to explore early release or late start options.

The committee did extensive research to establish what the best practices are for these options. They reached out to many other school districts to see what kind of early release or late start options they had tried, how they had been implemented, how successful they were, and what kind of challenges they presented. The committee came up with a plan that they think will serve the goals of providing more intentional planning time for teachers while not disrupting the operations of the district.

To find out more about how this proposal would be implemented, click the link below for the Frequently Asked Questions:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mZ9g1EvlNUYDvTJALmd-BTAyVwROdvGmvOmyyo8afOU/edit?usp=sharing