Elementary Teacher Planning Time: Finding Innovation through Focused Collaboration

School districts have distinctive circumstances surrounding the organization of the school day and how time is used or valued due to historical, political, and environmental factors that are as diverse and multifaceted as students are themselves (Innovative Approaches, 2013). When districts reconsider the use of time in a school day, it is an endeavor to find an ideal balance that serves students’ academic achievements, data-driven best practices, the responsibilities of teachers and staff, the legal constraints of the district, and parent and community expectations.

Districts throughout the U.S. have created model school day schedules filled with innovation, creativity, and flexibility (Innovative Approaches, 2013; Merritt, 2016; Benner & Partelow, 2017), but the sweet spot of master scheduling, instructional minutes, teacher planning, professional development, logistical constraints of bus routes, negotiations with unions, and local political pressures are not easily solved through a decree or mandate of a model schedule from another district or researched best practices. Instead, this level of change benefits from a multifaceted approach that includes the research and experience of other districts and honors local environments and practices.

The following case study explores the research and school day change processes conducted by a district, referred to here as HCPS (Harford County Public Schools), which serves 38,000 students and employs 5,400 full-time equivalent employees through fifty-five schools.