District/School Administration Administration
Education Reform

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning Final Report

Unlocking the Power of Time

November 1995

Dear Colleagues:

This report, "Unlocking the Power of Time," is the final report of the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning.

The Commission was appointed by the Board of Education and Commissioner two years ago, and directed by the Education Reform Act to develop a plan "to extend the time during which students attend school" and to review the costs and implications of extending the length of both the school day and school year. In the Commission's first report in 1994, recommendations were made concerning the content of the school day. Hearings subsequently were held around the state, and with the benefit of extensive public comment new time and learning standards were adopted in December 1994 which provide for more academic time in the form of structured learning for all students.

Now, the Commission is completing its work with a further set of recommendations on a number of topics, including teacher professional development, school restructuring, and school time issues. The recommendations in the report are based on solid research nationally as well as in Massachusetts. They provide substantial ground for public discussion in all communities.

It is important to recognize two points. First, the recommendations do not contain any new mandates. Second, no new state regulations are being proposed. The recommendations are offered by the Commission to stimulate the rich public discussion which began in 1994 and which continues in school communities across Massachusetts today. Recommendations about the length of the school day and school year reach directly into the communities and the homes of every family in Massachusetts, and every business as well. They merit a substantial amount of review, discussion, and debate, and we want to encourage members of the legislature, executive branch, parents, students, and educators alike to consider them thoroughly.

Sincerely,

Robert V. Antonucci
Commissioner of Education and Member, MA Board of Education and
Member, MA Commission on Time and Learning

S. Paul Reville
Chair, MA Commission on Time and Learning

Executive Summary

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning was formed by the Board of Education in November 1993 and was directed to evaluate instructional time and to develop "a plan to extend the time during which students attend school to reflect prevailing norms in advanced industrial countries and to address the educational needs of children in the Commonwealth...said plan shall contain a practical, but timely, proposal for implementation and detail all associated costs."

The challenge presented to public education today is vital. Massachusetts' public schools must significantly increase all students' learning in order to prepare them for success in today's world and the world of tomorrow. For most students, meeting the challenge of a high standard of learning will require more learning time. If Massachusetts' public schools intend to lead the movement to shape a 21st-century, high-performance school system that serves all students, we must come to grips with the challenge of redesigning schools to be more responsive to student needs. In so doing, public education must be flexible, make difficult changes, and demonstrate that public schools are as flexible and responsive to the needs of students as are private schools, experimental schools, for-profit schools, or the schools of other states and nations.

We must change the old school paradigm, what the National Commission on Time and Learning in their report, Prisoners of Time, called the "design flaw," which arbitrarily sets a fixed amount of time to learn. This fixed amount of time then results in some students learning at high standards and other students failing. Henceforth, learning must be the constant, the fixed and unchanging goal, and time must serve to enable every student to reach the highest standards of learning. Additionally, in the longer and more flexible days and years that school facilities are open, time must also serve to provide safe havens for those children who need them, and to offer families and communities a wide range of social, instructional, recreational, and cultural services.

This report, Unlocking the Power of Time, represents the final report of the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning and includes interrelated recommendations that, taken together, form a cohesive strategy for extending time and restructuring schools in support of high standards for all students.

Recommendations to enhance the use of the school day:

1. Prioritize academic learning. Protect structured learning time from disruptions or infringements.

Since the key to a student's success in school is the mastery of core academic skills and knowledge, the primary mission of schools is to put academic learning in the foreground.

2. Develop school schedules and programs which accommodate differences in rates of student learning. Assure that all students have a full opportunity to achieve mastery in core subjects.

Because students learn at different rates and in different ways, a variety of structured learning opportunities needs to be developed to ensure all students achieve high learning standards.

3. Provide sufficient time for teachers to engage in common planning, professional development, and collaborative activities.

For successful implementation of the curriculum frameworks, teachers will need time to develop and revamp course offerings and change pedagogy.

Recommendations regarding the structure of the school year:

4. Move toward lengthening the school year to 200 days. The Board of Education should promote policies and funding to make possible 190 days for students and 10 full days for teacher planning, professional development, and collaboration. The Legislature and the Executive Branch should support an appropriation for incentive funding to realize this recommendation.

By explicitly providing additional time, schools protect structured learning time for students as well as provide sufficient time for activities allowing students to achieve the high standards of learning envisioned in the curriculum frameworks and the Common Core of Learning. Additional time also provides Massachusetts' teachers with the opportunity for professional renewal and time to develop new teaching strategies and curriculum.

5. Restructure the school calendar to provide students optional access to learning tools and school services on a year-round basis.

The research on a restructured school year cites various models of year-round schools which indicate results ranging from improved learning retention, less time spent on reviewing formerly acquired skills, lower drop-out rates, decreased "burnout" among teachers, better attendance by both students and teachers, and improved opportunities for teacher renewal and support activities.

Recommendations supporting and enhancing the role of the community:

6. Utilize at least one school in four as an open, available Community Learning Center throughout the day and year.

Because the workday and structure of today's families are different from the past, schools and school resources must be more readily available for all members of the community.

7. Promote strong, involved, school and community partnerships to maximize learning.

In order to make the first seven recommendations possible, the Commission recommends that...

1. THE BOARD OF EDUCATION ensures that there are staff and resources available from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to provide technical assistance to schools and school districts in relation to time and learning restructuring.

2. EVERY LOCAL COMMUNITY initiates an active and participatory planning and implementation process, examines present practices in a systemic way, and takes the necessary steps toward realization of the recommendations in this report.

3. THE LEGISLATURE AND THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH appropriate funds for planning and implementation incentive grants for restructuring and promoting innovative approaches to increase structured learning time.

4. THE LEGISLATURE AND THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH appropriate additional funds for school building assistance to support facilities improvement to accommodate year-round use of school buildings.

The recommendations detailed above can only be implemented with broad collaboration between communities, policy makers, educators, family members, students, and state and local officials. The realization of the recommendations will mean that the Commonwealth can achieve the goal of high, equitable standards of learning that will prepare all our children to be life-long learners able to contribute and compete in the ever changing global economy.

It has become increasingly obvious that campaigns for higher standards of learning on the one hand and for sufficient time to achieve those standards on the other are wholly interdependent. They stand or fall together. Only a public determined to apply higher standards for all students will support more time and better time. But only more and better time will provide the teaching and learning needed to open the way for students to reach those standards.

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning has provided detail for each one of these recommendations and has considered cost and available resources in the overall approach taken in this report. We believe the report makes the case for both quantity and quality in education. We do not, of course, believe that time alone will solve our educational problems. Time alone guarantees nothing. But with it, all else is possible.

Table Of Contents

• Chapter I: Introduction
• Chapter II: Unlocking the Power of Time in the School DAY
• Chapter III: Unlocking the Power of Time in the School YEAR
• Chapter IV: Building the COMMUNITY
• Chapter V: Implementation
• Chapter VI: Conclusion
  Appendix A: Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning Vision
  Appendix B: 9-Point Action Plan for Time and Learning
  Appendix C: Massachusetts Common Core of Learning (abbreviated)
  Appendix D: Executive Summary of Prisoners of Time
  Appendix E: Abbreviated Summary Results - Survey of Time and Learning
  Appendix F: Promising Practices
  Appendix G: Estimated Financial Components of Extending Time (Maximum Cost)

Chapter I: INTRODUCTION

The need for more time, and the better use of time, for study of the core academic subjects in American schools is evident and urgent. In April of 1994, the report of the National Education Commission on Time and Learning, Prisoners of Time, declared that it would be unreasonable to believe that either the quality, or the equality, of American schools could be improved without substantial changes in the amount and uses of time allowed for teachers and students to do their work. The National Commission challenged states and localities to examine the role of time in their own school systems, and to ask themselves if their uses of the school day and school year adequately respond to the needs of all their students and teachers and community.

Massachusetts did not wait for the question to be asked from Washington. The Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993 had already directed the State Board of Education to evaluate instructional time, and to develop "a plan to extend the time during which students attend school to reflect prevailing norms in advanced industrial countries and to address the educational needs of children in the Commonwealth...said plan shall contain a practical, but timely, proposal for implementation and detail all associated costs."

This directive prompted the Board to create the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning. The Commission developed a vision statement in which schools provide safe learning environments that are open and available through the day and year with schedules that are responsive to the lives and needs of students, families and communities (Appendix A). In the first phase of its charge, the Commission developed a report reviewing instructional time. This report, Time for Change, was presented to the Board of Education. In response, the Commissioner and the Board developed school day/school year regulations and, at a meeting on December 20, 1994, the Board of Education adopted new student learning time standards for all schools which specified statewide minimum standards for the amount of "structured learning time" in core subjects for all students. The standards will be phased in during the years 1995-96 and 1996-97, according to plans developed in each local community by school administrators, teachers, parents and citizens. (For the "Action Plan" summarizing activities to be phased in for the student learning time standards, see Appendix B.) The student learning time initiative is a single step in the systemic education reform activities aimed at achieving greater equity and high standards in public education throughout the Commonwealth. By ensuring more academic time for each and every student, Massachusetts' public schools have begun to develop a foundation for students to gain the knowledge and skills called for in the 1994 Massachusetts Common Core of Learning (Appendix C). The Common Core is a set of broad educational goals which seek to answer the question, "What should students know and be able to do when they graduate from high school?" Although the Student Learning Time Regulations do not, by themselves, ensure equity or high standards, the regulations have prompted communities all across the Commonwealth to address, in a new and comprehensive way, the issue of time equity as it relates to high standards of learning.

Since the adoption of the student learning time standards, the Massachusetts Commission has been working to complete its charge. Here, we present the case for increasing time in schools and specific recommendations for accomplishing this task.

It is no small challenge to increase the quality and diminish the inequality in education. Historically, the search for a common core of learning goes back a full century. Often the challenge to identify core educational goals has been issued and been met only partially or not at all. In 1894, the National Education Association's Committee of Ten set forth a demanding academic core curriculum--and the time needed to teach it--for all high school students, whether or not they were college bound. It had only a decade of modest influence. Almost a century later, in 1983, the National Commission on Excellence in Education set the same challenge. Its report, A Nation at Risk, said more time on task had to be available if American students were to have full and equal chances to succeed at a much-needed common high school curriculum of the "new basics:" four years of English and three years each of mathematics, science, and social studies. By 1990, the number of students taking these "new basics" had risen from fourteen percent to nearly forty percent of high school graduates.

The combination of "top-down" recommendations with state and local implementation had made a difference. Still, troubling questions remained unanswered. What was the substance behind the course titles? Were courses in the United States' public schools as demanding as those in other countries or, for that matter, as demanding as those in our own leading schools? If not, the problems of competence and equity were still unsolved. These concerns led to the Charlottesville "summit" meeting of 1990 between President George Bush and the nation's governors, a meeting that launched the movement for national subject matter content standards. Their statement was clear: course titles were not enough; course contents had to be academically challenging and at least the equal of those in other industrialized countries. Finally, returning to the principles of the National Education Association's Committee of Ten and the National Commission's A Nation at Risk, all students had to be offered a fair opportunity to take (academic core) courses and to master the contents.

Clearly, these national initiatives have had an effect. Although questions have arisen about the propriety and the success of federally-funded standards projects, polls show a national consensus on the need to raise educational standards overall. A November 1994 poll of Massachusetts' residents by Opinion Dynamics Corporation found that seventy-nine percent favor establishing standards for what students should learn and setting goals that students have to meet. Forty-four percent said lengthening the school day is very important. The effort begun over a century ago to raise school standards is continued in Massachusetts by pursuing the broad standards articulated in its Common Core of Learning, and by moving quickly toward setting rigorous and challenging standards of academic content, first, through curriculum frameworks in each of seven essential disciplines and, then, through developing statewide assessments based on the content standards in those frameworks.

As states now take the lead and wrestle with their own academic standards and the curriculum frameworks to implement them, it becomes increasingly obvious that campaigns for higher standards of learning on the one hand and for sufficient time to achieve those standards on the other are wholly interdependent. They stand or fall together. Only a public determined to apply higher standards for all students will support more time and better time. But only more and better time will provide the teaching and learning needed to open the way for students to reach those standards. If separated, substantive gain in both may be lost--and lost with them will be the best opportunity for dramatic improvement in Massachusetts' public education for this generation. The investment by the Commonwealth and local communities is increasing dramatically, and the stakes for children could hardly be higher.

Needs and Implementation

This report, issued by the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning, is based on almost two years of focused study of the complex issues of time and learning. During the period since November 1993 when this Commission began its work, the Commission has reviewed reams of research on related issues both in the United States and in other countries, has completed a survey of the use of time in Massachusetts' schools, has participated in eleven public meetings/hearings, has made a survey of every state's school time requirements, has investigated in detail the costs and concerns of five districts to evaluate the potential impact of the student learning time standards, and has participated in discussions with numerous school and community members in Massachusetts. This report is also partly informed by discussions with members of the National Commission on Time and Learning and from their report, Prisoners of Time, issued last year (1994) in Washington. (Appendix D provides an executive summary of the National Commission's report.) The Massachusetts Commission echoes the urgency expressed in Prisoners of Time . That urgency is well-captured by the contrast drawn between the uses of time in American schools and in those of France, Germany, and Japan. On average, American high school students spend less than half the time of their foreign peers in the study of the major academic subjects.

Prisoners of Time reported that in 1991 nearly forty percent of America's high school (graduating) senior age group completed the basic academic curriculum recommended in A Nation at Risk. However, in the same year, more than sixty percent of the students in this same age group abroad were completing a more stringent curriculum including foreign languages. No longer can the difference be rationalized with the excuse that schools in other nations educate the elite while schools in the United States educate the masses. There is substantial evidence that other nations are facing as complex a challenge in education as the United States.

This situation is unacceptable, both because of the economic need for the United States' and Massachusetts' young people to compete successfully in the workplace and, even more certainly, because of the deeper civic and social needs to prepare active and judicious citizens who are also cultured human beings.

Particular Problems: Running Out of Time

The Massachusetts Time and Learning Commission's survey of time in schools (Appendix E) clearly shows that serious inequities exist in the amount of time provided for the academic work of students and teachers in Massachusetts' schools. Academic purposes must come first. We must reclaim academic time in the school day from the rigidity and compression of current school schedules.

Our schools run out of time. Too many activities are force-fit into the fixed and limited time available in a 6-hour day, a 5-day week, and a 180-day year. Many schools are closed by early to mid-afternoon, denying teachers and students the opportunities they need to extend and reinforce academic learning, and to participate in other activities in a safe and supportive environment.

Students run out of time. They are expected to reach high standards in the core subjects identified in the Massachusetts Common Core of Learning. We have long known that, even when strongly motivated and working under good conditions, students have different learning styles and need different lengths of time to learn. We have accepted this truism in driving, band, and sports. We do not give up early; we give plenty of time to practice, but in academics, we act as though each and every student can learn the complexities of history or science with the same enthusiasm and at the same pace. If students do not meet our time requirements, they do not succeed, are "held back" or moved on without the level of skill needed for the next grade. Each option sets off a chain of consequences too often leading to dropping out. These fixed and immutable schedules reflect the central "design flaw" in our school schedules and this flaw must be corrected to enable every student to have a fair opportunity to reach the goals set by the Common Core of Learning.

Teachers run out of time. They are expected to teach students all they need to learn in limited, lock-step periods of time, and do all kinds of other things as well; supervise lunch and recess; monitor study halls; watch the buses; fill in endless forms and respond to every summons from the PA system; discipline the unruly; advise the puzzled; and comfort the troubled. In most cases, teachers are expected to have done all this before 3 o'clock in the afternoon with no time left to meet with colleagues, plan engaging courses and lessons, and develop themselves professionally in both academic content and teaching methods. Dedicated teachers find that "school time" overtakes and uses up "home time" as they struggle to finish lesson plans, grade papers, keep up their reading, and plan upcoming curricula.

Parents, too, are running out of time. Increasingly, in homes with two parents, the economy forces both parents to work; in homes with one parent, the pressure is clearly even greater. Parents are unable to juggle their work schedules to fit their children's school schedules. They have less time than parents of earlier generations to support their children's education, to be present after school, or devote evening hours to supervising homework. At work they must worry about their latch-key offspring left adrift in mid-afternoon, open to peer pressures, to the stupidities and violence of television, or to the very real violence in their communities.

Local Initiatives Are Essential

Local initiatives are essential to implementing our recommendations. As with academic standards, only the commitment and imagination of local school leaders including superintendents, principals, teachers, parents, school committees, school councils, and active citizens, can bring lasting change. Common, statewide guidelines and the methods localities employ to put them into practice are needed to reinforce public commitment to the process of Education Reform.

Citizens of Massachusetts have the right and the obligation to hold their schools accountable for reaching the high standards that a modern democracy and changing economy require. New systems of assessing student achievement are being developed. Because these assessments will have real consequences for schools and students, we must increase the amount of academic time allotted for students to learn, as well as the time allotted for teachers to prepare their courses, to enhance their methods of instruction, and to evaluate student work. Otherwise, we shall fail to honor our own rhetoric about the equality of schooling in the Commonwealth.

Our task is not easy. It will demand the hard and unsettling responsibility of setting priorities and working for real change. No doubt, many will find discomfort in making the needed systemic changes. We do not ignore or minimize the importance of non-academic instruction and other school activities. Many are very helpful for daily life, and others are vital to the kind of personal and school morale that sustains all efforts to learn. The importance of all of the activities in which schools are engaged are only added reasons to take time more seriously than we have up to now. The recommendations contained in this report try to address these necessities and offer a broader, more inclusive vision of education that is both challenging and democratic.

What follows is the Commission's three-part response to these crises of time. First, we consider time in the school day, together with options for extending it and improving the use of time. Second, we focus on the school year, on its length and structure, as well as options for expanding access to educational tools and services within the twelve calendar months. Third, we take up the many-faceted ways in which the school and community may work more closely together in the interests of better education and of healthier family and community life.

The recommendations in each section of the report are interrelated. There are seven quality recommendations and four implementation recommendations. Taken together, these eleven recommendations form a cohesive strategy for restructuring schools for the 21st century and for unlocking the power of time in our schools.

Chapter II: Unlocking the Power of Time in the School DAY

In December 1994, the Board of Education adopted the Student Learning Time Regulations. These regulations support a key principle: EQUITY of time for students. By September 1997 every student in the Commonwealth will be receiving a full schedule of "structured learning time" focused on attaining the knowledge and skills identified in the Common Core of Learning (Appendix C). Schools across the Commonwealth are examining how the school day is presently structured and seeking ways to consider how it must be restructured to ensure that all students have a fair opportunity for learning.

The Board, in its student learning time standards, focuses on EQUITY and QUALITY. The regulations can only ensure equitable time; whereas, communities must ensure that the time provided for structured learning is high quality and genuinely promotes high standards for student learning.

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning maintains that schools must examine their present practices in a systemic way and the Commission has outlined specific steps schools can take in Chapter V on Implementation Practices. As the examination of current practice proceeds and schools begin to finalize schedule offerings, the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning makes the following three recommendations:

School Day Recommendations

1. Prioritize academic learning. Protect structured learning time from disruptions or infringements.

2. Develop school schedules and programs which accommodate differences in rates of student learning. Assure that all students have a full opportunity to achieve mastery in core subjects.

3. Provide sufficient time for teachers to engage in common planning, professional development, and collaborative activities.

Recommendation #1 seeks to protect the structured learning time scheduled for students. This recommendation rests on the principle that the primary mission of schools is to put academic learning in the foreground. The key to a student's success in school is mastery of core academic skills and knowledge: what used to be called "reading, writing and arithmetic." Gaining expertise in academic learning must take precedence over extra-curricular activities, as well as certain school services. The Massachusetts Commission reiterates the recommendations in Time for Change, specifically that schools minimize the use of "pull-out" services and further create flexibility in the school day to allow uninterrupted and focused opportunities for teaching and learning in key courses. Appendix F contains a selection of "promising practices" which we urge schools to consider.

Recommendation #2 focuses on the design flaw identified in the National Commission report, Prisoners of Time, which shows that schools are designed around a fixed amount of time. This fixed amount of time results in unequal learning opportunities for students. Although the Board of Education has ensured that, at a minimum, all students will receive equal time, we know that equal learning for all students will not result because students do not all learn in the same way and at the same pace. The Massachusetts Commission recommends a variety of structured learning opportunities be made available to students. Schedules should utilize larger segments of time to promote diversified teaching methods and techniques which respect individual student learning styles. These opportunities should allow for both depth and breadth of learning, as well as enrichment and mastery of learning experiences for all students.

Programs which are well-suited to diverse learners allow for some students to take more time and others less. Programs should provide opportunities for students to learn in smaller groups for different types of learning activities as well as spending a full morning or afternoon exploring topics in depth.

Recommendation #3 focuses on teachers' needs for time other than instructional time. If we are to achieve the full scope of change and restructuring envisioned by the Educational Reform Act, then we must ensure sufficient planning time and staff learning opportunities as well as time to develop and upgrade curriculum. For successful full implementation of the curriculum frameworks, teachers will need time to develop and revamp course offerings and change pedagogy. The need for common planning time will not be temporary, but will be ongoing if we are to sustain our capacity for collaboration. Collaboration is a key pedagogical assumption underlying the high standard of learning envisioned by the curriculum frameworks. Additionally, teachers need to be active participants in examining and reflecting on the kinds of change the school community may undertake in order to revise the school day.

Teachers must consider if their own schedules need to be restructured in order to support the restructured school program and to provide the best teaching and learning opportunities. Contracts or policies which constrain or inhibit flexible scheduling deserve reexamination. Massachusetts' teachers work long hours and long days. Notwithstanding the fact that teachers in other countries (particularly our economic competitors) frequently have longer work days and work years, Massachusetts' teachers tend to spend more time than their foreign counterparts in the classroom working directly with students; however, many of the hours Massachusetts' teachers work are in isolation from other professionals. Conversely, teachers in other countries have considerably more common planning and professional development time than Massachusetts' teachers. While we do not wish to replicate the culture or differences which have resulted in the educational systems in other countries, we do wish to maintain a high quality and competitive education in Massachusetts. Therefore, we encourage schools to consider methods to break down the isolation of individual teachers and to create more professional days and differentiated schedules which provide time for common planning and interaction.

In sum, even with the new statewide student learning time standards, the burden of improving quality lies at the local level. Each school community must take responsibility for providing high quality teaching and learning opportunities and a challenging educational environment for all students. School communities need to consider not only the school day, but also the school year as they examine their present practices and assess how best to reach their goals.

Chapter III: Unlocking the Power of Time in the School YEAR

This section of the report recommends changes in the current school year and traditional school calendar. Two keys for unlocking the power of time are INNOVATION and A COMPREHENSIVE PROCESS. We now examine our present practice not only in relation to the school day, but also in relation to the school "year," and make recommendations that are consistent with those of the National Commission and the pedagogical assumptions of the state curriculum frameworks and upcoming statewide assessments. In concert with the three recommendations for the use of time in the school day, the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning makes the following two recommendations:

School Year Recommendations

4. Move toward lengthening the school year to 200 days. The Board of Education should promote policies and funding to make possible 190 days for students and 10 full days for teacher planning, professional development, and collaboration. The Legislature and the Executive Branch should support an appropriation for incentive funding to realize this recommendation.

5. Restructure the school calendar to provide students optional access to learning tools and school services on a year-round basis.

Recommendation #4 is aimed at supporting broader options for overall school programs. Additional days for students with a corresponding increase in structured learning time would provide Massachusetts' schools with a key resource necessary to realize the ambitious standards for students outlined by the Common Core of Learning and detailed in the curriculum frameworks. Additional days for teachers are aimed at ensuring that teachers receive sufficient and sustained time periods to develop their professional skills and to collaborate to ensure that the school programs are consistent with the school mission and meet student needs. By explicitly providing this time, schools protect structured learning time for students while at the same time provide for a teaching workforce which is able to develop new teaching strategies and curriculum by effectively utilizing technology, interdisciplinary content and interdisciplinary approaches.

The Massachusetts Commission does not envision additional time on this scale without additional cost, even with creative planning and willing teachers. The Massachusetts Commission encourages the Board of Education to work closely with the Legislature and the Executive Branch to make this additional time a policy priority with incentive funding for schools to restructure and to increase structured learning time. This recommendation is discussed in greater detail in Chapter V, our chapter on Implementation Practices. Education professionals know that more quantity does not necessarily equal more quality. It is therefore necessary to involve the full community in discussions on the best utilization of additional time in order to ensure quality and support for the educational process. One constituency is business. Business leaders demonstrated support or increased school time even prior to the Education Reform Act. In 1991 the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education said, "to allow sufficient time for professional development (growth and renewal) activities of teachers, for additional academic work and pedagogical experimentation, and for improved integration of social support services, school time should be increased significantly, in some cases as much as twenty percent (20%) or more." (Every Child a Winner, July 1991).

Recommendation #4 should be considered together with recommendation #5.

Recommendation #5 asks schools to restructure the school year to provide year-round access to learning tools and services. This recommendation is based on the principle of FLEXIBILITY in response to differing student needs, allowing for continuous learning opportunities throughout the year. As stated in recommendation #2, students do learn at different rates in different subjects and at different points in their development. The current traditional Massachusetts school year structure supports an assumption that all students progress identically. The research on a restructured school year cites various models of year-round schools which indicate results ranging from improved learning retention, less time spent on reviewing formerly acquired skills, lower drop-out rates, decreased "burnout" among teachers, better attendance by both students and teachers, and improved opportunities for teacher renewal and support activities.

Additional days and year-round access provide the opportunity to schedule learning opportunities for both students and professionals over a twelve-month period by using flexible schedules. Support staff and paraprofessionals can be utilized, supporting access to school facilities and learning technology during periods when school is not in session.

Research from Coleman, (Equity and Education Opportunity (1966) and Politics, Markets and America's Schools (1990)), supports the position that access to learning tools (encyclopedias, computers, books) is determined by the socioeconomic status of the family and in turn is a significant determinant of school achievement. Therefore, year-round access supports the principle of EQUITY, and access is critical if all students are to be provided with the opportunities for the depth of learning envisioned by the Common Core of Learning and the Massachusetts curriculum frameworks.

Chapter IV: Building the COMMUNITY

The school day and the school year are only a part of a student's learning opportunities. In order for students to have the best learning opportunities, the full community must be involved. U.S. Secretary of Education Riley has said that "family involvement in children's learning is critical to students doing well in school and later succeeding in college or attaining a good job." Public comment during the development of the student learning time standards clearly identified the involvement of parents and the community as integral to the overall quality of the learning environment. Parents expressed concern about the safety of their children and the need for community programs to provide for their children's safety when parents must work. Research shows that teachers rank strengthening parents' involvement in their children's education as the highest priority issue in public education policy over the next few years. ("Employers, Families, Education," U.S. Department of Education, September 1994)

The Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education said on page 10 of their 1991 report, Every Child A Winner, "In coming years, the link between education and industry will be even more critical as a better educated and specialized workforce will be needed to fill available jobs. Meeting this challenge is not the burden of the education system alone. Other stakeholders, including industry, must understand that they have roles in ensuring that education meets the needs of society."

During 1994, the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning presented its Vision for schools (Appendix A). The Vision emphasizes that schools must be prepared to meet the changing needs of students, families and communities. The first five recommendations in this report begin to address how to make this vision a reality. For the Vision to be fully realized, families, schools, businesses and communities must come together to define their needs and develop their community's vision for their schools. This broader partnership forms the basis for the next two recommendations:

Community Recommendations

6. Utilize at least one school in four as an open, available Community Learning Center throughout the day and year.

7. Promote strong, involved, school and community partnerships to maximize learning.

Recommendations #6 and #7 are based on the principles of COMMUNITY and PROVIDING A SAFE HAVEN. There is only one "agency" that can be found in every community across the Commonwealth -- the school, and it is often the most expensive resource in which a community invests. Considering the changing requirements of the family and community, is this resource used to its greatest advantage? Should the return on investment be more fully realized by providing the option of utilizing school facilities after normal school hours? We think so. Schools and communities need to consider the ongoing educational needs of all members of the community as society changes from an industrial-based to an information-based economy.

Many school schedules still reflect the agricultural world of the past and an assumption that there is a parent at home during the day. Today, the workday of parents and the structure of families are very different with increasing demands and hours at variance with the starting and closing times of schools. School vacations and release days cause child-care problems for many families, and too many children come home to an empty house without adult supervision available. The streets increasingly beckon and students are vulnerable. If the school building is our most expensive resource facility, our children are an even more precious resource, and if needed, the schools must be made more readily available to them.

Schools should become Community Learning Centers available to students and families who choose to utilize the services. These Centers should meet needs identified by the community, open early in the morning, and remain open until late in the evening as a resource providing intergenerational opportunities for learning. Centers can support adults wishing to upgrade or learn skills to respond to an ever changing workforce.

The Common Core of Learning identified broad educational goals for Massachusetts students. The goals are ambitious and all citizens must play their part. A preamble to the Common Core of Learning states key points annotated here:

Using schools as Community Learning Centers to promote strong partnerships requires commitments from policy makers to provide incentives for communities to make the shift from having schools which are open for only the traditional school day for fewer than half the days of the year to having schools that are open and available throughout the day and year as centers of learning. Policy makers must be vigilant in their efforts to fulfill their obligation to support educational resources and services.

Families must take full responsibility to support learning at home, to encourage curiosity, love of learning, and pride in a job well done so that children can be active seekers of knowledge and dedicated learners. Families must take responsibility to limit students' TV time, and to ensure that time is available for their children to complete homework. Finally, families must be aware of local educational programs so they may participate in and support their schools as much as possible.

Students must take responsibility for recognizing the importance of education in their lives. They must participate actively in their own learning both at school and outside of school. Students must balance the need to complete homework and to take part in other school activities with their desire to work part-time or to engage in recreational activities.

Educators and others employed by school districts must be open to an examination of the educational systems' rules, regulations and practices which guide their work. They must participate in an open evaluation of existing contracts to determine if the contracts really support the kind of teaching and learning that the community values and that will serve students best. Educators must encourage the involvement of families, along with business and community members, by fostering active educational partnerships, including mentoring.

Communities must develop new structures that meet the stresses and demands of today's students' lives and which foster a climate of safety. Communities must create educational environments that encourage high achievement and reward hard work.

Businesses must work with schools to create partnerships and to promote policies for employee involvement in school and child-care activities. Businesses must recognize that partnerships are long term investments in preparing their future workforce by improving the quality of education in the schools. Businesses should create opportunities for students to apply their learning in working environments.

Educational partnerships require shared responsibility and do not relieve any member of a partnership from contributing to or taking responsibility in pursuit of the larger goal of promoting success for learners of all ages.

Chapter V: Implementation

The seven recommendations contained in the School Day, School Year and School Community chapters cannot be accomplished easily. Therefore, the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning has four additional recommendations for implementation that we believe will help to make these changes possible:

Implementation Recommendations

The Commission Recommends that:

1. THE BOARD OF EDUCATION ensures that there are staff and resources available from the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to provide technical assistance to schools and school districts in relation to time and learning restructuring.

2. EVERY LOCAL COMMUNITY initiates an active and participatory planning and implementation process, examines present practices in a systemic way, and takes the necessary steps toward realization of the recommendations in this report.

3. THE LEGISLATURE AND THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH appropriate funds for planning and implementation incentive grants for restructuring and promoting innovative approaches to increase structured learning time.

4. THE LEGISLATURE AND THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH appropriate additional funds for school building assistance to support facilities improvement to accommodate year-round use of school buildings.

In Implementation Recommendation #1, the Massachusetts Commission recommends that the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education designate staff familiar with restructuring issues to work with schools, school districts, and school communities as they seek to meet the implementation requirements of the Student Learning Time Regulations and move beyond the minimums to provide a broader and more comprehensive community educational experience. The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning believes that the Department must make a commitment to maintain and develop the internal capacity to conduct independent research, tap national sources of information, disseminate "best practice" information, and thereby assist schools with the complex issues inherent in restructuring educational environments.

In Implementation Recommendation #2, the Massachusetts Commission recommends a systemic approach to the examination of present practices. We have outlined a three-step process which we believe can be helpful:

First, examine current practices with staff and community input. Any attempt to recover or reorganize time within the school begins by generating and collecting information on how time is currently used. The examination of current practices should not be limited to a single community. Gather state and national data on time and learning resources and programs. Disseminate and discuss as much of this information as is feasible.

Second, assess local priorities with a focus on student learning, staff development, and community needs and interests. Communities must define what they are trying to accomplish. Once community goals have been identified, it is possible to reorganize around those goals and to reprioritize the allocation of time for activities and programs that support them.

Any process of change requires strong partnerships and involvement of the full community from the outset. In restructuring school time, an open process of community involvement and education is needed to have the strongest commitment to an improved program.

Whichever approach is chosen, keep the focus on learning and on the goals the community has identified. Ensure that the details do not become more important than the purposes. Consider field testing changes.

Third, find appropriate alternatives using local priorities as a guide. Successful strategies will need to capitalize on all opportunities and directly address all constraints. Each community may find several possible alternatives to achieve its goals. Each alternative will have clear implications for professional development, budget and finances, and community support. Consider together what the community wishes to accomplish, and work together to accomplish identified goals. Know and agree what policy makers will do, what parents will do, what teachers will do, what students will do, what business members will do, what community members will do, and what all partners will do together. Then do it.

In Implementation Recommendation #3, the Massachusetts Commission further recommends that the Legislature and Executive Branch provide funds for a continuing incentive grant to make it possible for school districts to begin the planning and activities necessary for a systemic evaluation of the use of time in their school community and to implement significant restructuring. The Massachusetts Commission first stated this recommendation in the second chapter of this report in Recommendation #4 on lengthening the school year. We reiterate it here because we believe that additional time for students is critical if we are to provide real opportunity for the achievement of high standards. However, even with the best efforts, few school districts will be able to add significant additional time without some additional funds.

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning has considered what the cost to the Commonwealth as a whole would be to increase school time. The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning began work on reviewing instructional time and developing a plan to increase the amount of time that students are in school in November of 1993. At that time, our charge included providing information about the cost implications of increasing school time. Public comment in response to the draft student learning time standards was strongly influenced by a concern for available funds to increase school time. Our analysis would be incomplete without considering additional cost, and as we developed our recommendations, we were mindful of costs and available financing.

Our deliberations were influenced by the creativity we observed during the course of the recent 1994-95 school year. During that school year, we observed a number of school districts that embarked on planning and implementation processes for extending school time without significant new money. Schools found time in the existing school day and created time through innovative use of schedules, effective use of paraprofessionals, increased use of technology, and through participation of school community members and parents. Since it is not possible to put a price tag on creativity, we have settled upon providing a cost estimate based on a calculation extending the school's foundation budget level commensurate with the additional days being added. As a starting point, the foundation budget uses figures generally accepted as representative of salaries and services typical of schools in the Commonwealth. This cost calculation represents maximum costs, not a range of costs, which would be more reflective of the kinds of changes and associated costs we have seen in schools engaged in restructuring during this past school year. With these reservations, the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning believed it was important to provide a basis to begin the dialogue on cost.

Cost calculations in this report utilized only those elements of the foundation formula which would, reasonably, be considered elements which may indeed cost additional money: teacher and support salaries, added funds for special populations, textbooks, and school maintenance. The specific calculations based on the foundation formula can be found in Appendix G. This "maximum cost" calculation indicates that adding, for instance, a single instructional day in every elementary school in the Commonwealth could cost over $5 million. However, we know that in 1995 not all schools are at foundation levels and the Legislature and Executive Branch have increased funding appropriations for education more each year since the enactment of Education Reform. The State will continue to "ramp up" to foundation levels until the year 2000. Additional funds may not be available to increase school time on a maximum cost basis. However, we believe that adding time is urgent, and we believe that the Legislature and the Executive Branch must appropriate incentive funding which will allow at least some number of districts to provide leadership toward providing more time for students and teachers. Incentive grants would also provide an increasing body of evidence on the effect of restructured time and learning on student achievement.

The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning believes that enough funds must be provided to allow schools to begin the process of restructuring, and that all schools must have the opportunity, over time, to access these incentive funds. Research has shown that incentive grants and professional development funding are two education reform investment strategies producing the highest yield. The Commission recognizes that the relationship between funds and achievement is extraordinarily complex. A recent article in the Harvard Education Letter (Volume XI, Number 2, March/April 1995) reviews the link between spending and outcomes and quotes Harold Howe, former U.S. Commissioner of Education in saying, "Children's success in school is tied to their opportunities in families and communities and to their health, nutrition, housing, recreation, and chances to associate with adults in constructive relationships. How can we ever put a reasonable price tag on all these factors?" We cannot. However, all schools want to provide the best for their community. The powerful notions of TIME, FLEXIBILITY, SAFE HAVENS, RESTRUCTURING, INNOVATION, A SYSTEMIC APPROACH TO LEARNING, and PARTNERSHIPS combine to produce a great synergy communities can harness for the benefit of all children.

In Implementation Recommendation #4, the Massachusetts Commission looks again to the Legislature and Executive Branch to stand behind the Education Reform Act's commitment to education and the public good. We believe that funding increases to the School Building Assistance account should be appropriated to not only provide for existing facility improvement (such as air conditioning), but also should provide funds for design of new facilities and new construction which is consistent with year-round use and an effective teaching and learning environment.

Chapter VI: Conclusion

The challenge for public education that the people of Massachusetts face today is many-faceted. Not least of the reasons to meet it squarely is to remain faithful to the tradition of popular learning that dates from the first settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in the 17th century, and was carried on in the ideal of the common school as expressed in Horace Mann's annual reports to the Massachusetts Board of Education in the 1830's and 1840's. Then as today, the economic and social world of the Commonwealth was rapidly changing as new industries, new people and cultures, and new patterns of trade had to be considered. Then, too, the citizens and their elected state and local officials urgently debated the questions of how much and what kind of schooling would best serve them and their democracy, and at what cost.

Massachusetts' public schools must serve and prepare students for success in today's world and the world of tomorrow. In so doing, public schools must be flexible, make difficult changes, and proactively counter the charge that public schools are less able to meet the needs of the day than are private schools, or experimental schools, or for-profit schools, or the schools of other states and nations. Because they belong to all the citizens, are governed by citizen boards, and are open to all children, public schools are at the heart of a democratic society in our day as surely as they were in Horace Mann's. What they do or do not do deeply affects the vigor of a democratic society and its quality of life.

Some have referred to time as "the last frontier of educational reform." If Massachusetts' public schools intend to lead the movement to shape a 21st-century, high-performance school system that serves all students effectively, then we must cross this frontier and come to grips with the challenge of redesigning schools to be more responsive to student needs. We must change the old school paradigm, what Prisoners of Time called the "design flaw," that has made time the constant and thereby has forced student learning to be the variable. Henceforth, learning must be the constant, the fixed and unchanging goal, and time the variable that serves it. In the longer and more flexible days and years that school facilities are open, schools must also serve to provide safe havens for those children who need them, and to offer families and communities a wide range of social, instructional, recreational, and cultural services. Schools are often the largest investment a community makes. We are convinced that such investment will repay citizens much more richly when the power of time is freed from old restraints to exercise its full potential. Other democratic countries, less wealthy than ours, have made these changes. So can we.

Time alone will not solve our educational problems; many other factors must be present: skilled and knowledgeable teachers, safe and orderly classrooms, curricular standards and assessments, consequences for performance, students who are motivated and hard working, supportive parents and neighborhoods. However, time is the unforgiving, inescapable gate keeper. Not a single one of these favorable factors can flourish if time is too short. Time alone guarantees nothing. But with it, all else is possible. Teachers and students and parents understand that very well, and we must act on it.

The recommendations of this Massachusetts Commission make up a systemic chain of necessities:

• We cannot fulfill the vision of the Massachusetts Common Core of Learning without better, more equitable, learning on the part of all of our children.
• We cannot have better, more equitable, learning without more time on task.
• We cannot have more time on task without adding hours for the core academic subjects.
• We cannot add core subject hours without pressing other worthy school activities into later hours of the afternoon, or adding to the number of school days in the year.
• We cannot have good teaching in those added hours without giving teachers more time for themselves (and for each other) for planning and designing courses and lessons, and for the professional development needed to provide academic content at higher standards.
• We cannot give teachers more time without adding hours to the school day or days to the school year, or both.
• We cannot have good teaching or learning when children are hungry for food or friends, or are afraid of what they will find in the street or at home after school hours.
• We cannot have children who feel secure and are ready to learn without making the school a safe and supportive place.
• We cannot have engaged and supportive parents and communities without making their schools welcoming places that improve the quality of their daily lives.
• All of these necessities can only happen if we transform how schools deal with time, which in turn we cannot do without the full community understanding the issues, making the commitment to change, and obtaining or providing the necessary resources.

It is our hope that this report will generate a good measure of discussion, enhance understanding of the issues and build commitment. The Board of Education will continue to be committed to policies which support student opportunities to learn and to achieve the goals of the Common Core of Learning. The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education will do all it can to help local schools and citizens develop and put into practice their own programs for educational improvement, including providing technical assistance and consultants, reports and materials on the issues of time, planning methods, and models from other school systems that could be adapted to local goals and conditions. The Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning has worked hard to face the issue of time squarely and to provide our best thoughts and recommendations for a strategic course of action. The rest is up to the citizens of Massachusetts.