Dear Members of the Brighton School Community, 

As part of the 2021-22 Blueprint Planning Process, the District is examining its school day start and end times and looking for opportunities to allow secondary students to start school later in the morning to be consistent with the American Medical Association (AMA) and American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommendations.

We are interested in your feedback on a scenario being reviewed by the current committee. This scenario stems from the study performed in the 2016-17 school year. It attempts to balance cost impact, community priorities provided in the previous survey, and medical research.

Summary of Changes Being Reviewed:

The scenario being reviewed meets both the AMA and AAP recommendations of a start time no earlier than 8:30 a.m. for both TCMS and BHS. This change would allow start times to be 45 to 50 minutes later. School would end at 3:24 and 3:37 p.m., respectively. The District would maintain at least 30 minutes for after-school help and club activities. Extracurricular sports and VPA rehearsals would start at approximately 4:10 p.m.

The start time for CRPS would be 30 minutes earlier to minimize impact on the number of new buses required. CRPS students would be picked up starting at 7 a.m. Start and end times for FRES would be unchanged from the current state and there would be no impact to early morning activities for FRES. CRPS and FRES buses would have the same drivers servicing the same neighborhoods.

This option is estimated to require five additional buses in the morning and 10 additional buses in the afternoon at a cost of approximately $37,500 per bus run (morning and afternoon) for a total of $562,500. Without new revenues such as State Aid, this cost is equivalent to a 1.0% increase in taxes in year one and inflationary adjustments thereafter. The State Aid reimbursement rate for transportation is approximately 61%. Transportation Aid would begin in year 2 of implementation.

We need your input! Please click on this link to participate in a Thought Exchange about the start times. This particular tool allows you to see all of the comments being made by your classmates, colleagues, and neighbors. It allows you to comment and rate comments, all anonymously. The exchange format helps all of us see how the community feels and to build on each other’s perspectives. If you create an account, you will be able to log back in at a later time and see how others rated your comments.

If families have children in multiple schools, they can post the thought under the stakeholder group that is most relevant. You can post additional thoughts under different stakeholder group categories if you want to provide thoughts on multiple school levels.

The Thought Exchange will close on Sunday, Jan. 9, 2022.

Thank you