Dare County School’s 2020-2021 year will begin August 17 for students

Dare County Schools’ Superintendent, John Farrelly, stated that the 2020-2021 school calendar would begin on August 17 for students in an emailed message to parents and their families.

Per the update, the school calendar had to be amended in order to meet the new requirements included in Senate Bill 704. A requirement to add five more school days, and designate five days as remote learning days, was also included in the update.

The full message from Superintendent John Farrelly is below.

Good afternoon Dare County families,

The Dare County Board of Education met last evening in a virtual May 12 business meeting. The board of education approved an amended 2020- 2021 school calendar. The school calendar had to be amended in order to meet the new requirements included in Senate Bill 704 that was signed into law by Governor Cooper. Among the mandated changes to the school calendar are:

1. A requirement to make August 17the first day of school for students.
2. A requirement to add 5 more school days to the calendar.
3. A requirement to designate 5 days in the calendar as remote learning days. We will have the flexibility to move these remote learning days as needed for inclement weather. As an example- if we missed 3 days in early September due to a hurricane, we could count those 3 days as remote learning days and convert 3 scheduled remote days to instructional days.

We have kept intact many of the initial recommendations from our calendar committee including Christmas and spring breaks.

In other news, the Board of Education approved my recommendation to promote Ms. Sandy Kinzel from Assistant Superintendent to Associate Superintendent.  In addition, Dr. Keith Parker has shifted from the Director of Middle Schools and Digital Communications to Director of Secondary Education (6-12) and Digital Communications. In order to be effective in supporting our high school programs, we are going to take a shared approach with current leaders taking on more roles as opposed to hiring a new assistant superintendent. This is a significant cost-savings measure for our public school budget.

My best,

John