BELLE — Maries County R-2 Board of Education on Jan.25 asked their newly sworn-in Student Advisor to the Board if she had a preference regarding the 2022-23 graduation date as they are working on the district’s calendar for that school year.

The discussion began when Superintendent Dr. Lenice Basham said she put out the district calendar from the committee and didn’t get a lot of parent feedback.

“The other thing that had come up from the high school staff was the possibility of moving graduation to May 21 and letting the students be out the 17, 18, 19. They would still get some days out,” Basham said. “But it allows the teachers to get their grades in, allows the kids to finish up assignments for graduation. I said I would propose that to you all.”

Board President Joey Butler II asked what the teachers’ number one choice of the calendar was.

“There is just the one calendar,” Basham said.

“Well, I have always said that we have the committee come up with it and if we aren’t going to listen to them, we might as well just do it ourselves,” Butler said. “I like it. Looks good.”

Basham asked if they wanted to leave graduation where it is, because it is scheduled on Mother’s Day.

Director Kenda Sanders said they have gone through that conversation.

“The high school was requesting that we move it to the 21,” Basham said. “The high school teachers. And then we would still give the seniors some time off that week before graduation and the teachers thought it would give them more time to get their grades in because they are taking their finals and then immediately have to have everything in for graduation.”

Director Amy Kiso asked if they moved graduation back to May 21 and students came back on May 19 to do their awards and practice grads, would they still be off Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday?

“Yes, the seniors and everyone else will be here,” Basham said. “But there is a good chance we are going to have snow days and it would push us back at the end of the year anyways.”

Kiso said she would make a motion to go from there or did they want to handle that differently?

“Should we ask our new student advisor to survey that class of seniors?” Kiso said.

Sanders said Student Advisor Rachel Baretich would be a senior in 2023.

“How would you want to handle it?” Sanders asked Baretich. “Would you want it on May 21 or the 14, which is Mother’s Day?”

Baretich asked why mothers wouldn’t want to watch their kids graduate on Mother’s Day.

“We have done it some years and others we haven’t,” Kiso explained.

We aren’t talking about the moms, we are talking about you,” Sanders said to Baretich.

Butler asked if anyone else had an opinion one way or the other about holding graduation on May 21 or going against what the high school teachers thought.

“Really we are leaving the calendar as it is, the only thing we are doing is making the graduation date from the 14 to the 21,” Basham said.

Butler asked the board for a motion so they could discuss it.

“How about I make a motion to approve the calendar as is but separate from that I would like to see Rachel jump right in and survey those who will be graduating and see what they think,” Kiso said.

Basham asked if she wanted to take the graduation date off of the calendar and Kiso said yes.

Director Brent Stratman seconded the motion so the board could discuss it further.

“So, not saying the input wouldn’t be good, but have we ever before asked for student input, and are we going to continue to do it for the whole thing?” Butler asked. “Or is this just ‘let’s see what they think about graduation?”

Kiso said there were a lot of years when they first moved in there was a debate about Mother’s Day, yes, or Mother’s Day, no.

“So, yes, there has always been input from the community and I know students have been surveyed about it before,” Kiso said.

Sanders asked Garret Haslag, high school principal, what his thoughts were.

“The only thing is that I don’t really have a con about it being on the 21,” he said. “The kids are going to get out the same days regardless. Maybe you get better attendance and don’t have mothers who have cousins — they get to spend the day with their family by going to their cousin’s graduation. If there was a lot of cons on the 21st I’d say leave it on the 14th, but I don’t. I mean, I guess people could schedule vacations, but according to our calendar, we have built-in days. Nobody really should schedule vacations then. As soon as we get snow days, we have people call and say, hey, we planned a vacation.”

Butler said if they planned it now, they are over a year away.

“That is the only con I can think of is people like to leave as soon as school’s out, but there isn’t really a con for me,” he said.

Sanders said she was going to make a statement that would probably be unpopular.

“How good are we about getting grades in now for the high school teachers?” Sanders asked.

Haslag said he tracked it all last semester. Some teachers were not as good as others.

“We have some action going forward to correct some, but I haven’t it as much this semester. I harped on it a bunch last semester and honestly need to be doing it consistently to ensure it,” Haslag said.

Sanders said her only complaint or drawback about moving the date for the teachers is the reason for the move.

“If we are not doing very good about getting the grades in on a regular basis, why should we move and adjust this academic calendar and move a graduation date?” she asked. “I don’t like that.”

Haslag said from his perspective, he has only ever heard that the reason to move the date was that it is on Mother’s Day and not because of the grades thing.

“It does give people more time, but I think the real rationale is just the fact that mothers don’t — honestly some of the members on our staff will say they don’t attend graduation because they are going to do something with their moms,” Haslag said.

He added that it looks bad when they have graduation and most of the teachers aren’t present. Last year, they did have better attendance than most previous years.

“If I could have everybody there, I would have everybody there,” Haslag said. “Kids are walking across the stage that you have had (in class) for four years.”

He added that his in-laws are family-driven and they usually go do something with them on Mother’s Day, but he doesn’t go if graduation is on Mother’s Day.

Becky Landsford, a Title One teacher present at the meeting, asked the board if they would listen to her opinion.

“As a mother with a senior graduating next year, I would really like to see it moved to the 21st for that exact same reason,” she said. “I still have my mother living, we do Mother’s Day and we honor all of our mothers, we do it at my sister’s house, we honor all of her sisters-in-law who are mothers and it is really hard to run from one celebration to the other or not do the other one at all.”

Lansford added that in years past she has personally not attended graduation because of the date it was on and did her own thing.

Sanders said she wasn’t ok with the justification that they needed more time to put grades in.

Basham said it depends on when they do finals.

“I didn’t want to move it to the 7th because they would be out eight days and it is too far forward,” Basham said. “It is either Mother’s Day or we move it back.”

Sanders said they could do it on a Saturday or Friday night.

Kiso said they had surveyed the community about that too not too long ago but can’t remember the results. Butler said one of the biggest pushbacks was family coming in from out-of-town who wouldn’t get there on Friday.

Butler asked for a vote if there was no further discussion. The board passed the measure with a 6-0 vote to approve the calendar, minus the graduation date, and have Baretich survey the students for input.

Other conversations about the calendar included parent feedback.

“I got two parents who wanted us to go on the Monday before Christmas but it would be adding another Monday to our schedule and puts out teachers working two Mondays in a row,” Basham said. “I am not sure that they would be open to that.”