After wading through a laundry list of Wednesday early release alternatives, the school board remains undecided on the best way to meet Gunnison parents in the middle.
Nearly four years after the major schedule change, early-release Wednesdays at Gunnison schools still remain a point of contention for a number of parents and teachers. The program has been successful in Crested Butte, largely as the result of well-established after school programming. In Gunnison, parents are still split. Some have argued the early release schedule is only an added burden on working families who must find child care in the middle of the week.
Taking parents’ complaints into consideration, the school board hesitated when it came time to approve the 2025-26 school calendar earlier this month and asked Superintendent Leslie Nichols to explore alternative weekly schedules. At a work session on Monday, Feb. 24, she presented a list of ranked options that considered ideas like shifting early release to Friday, moving to a four-day school week and removing early release entirely in exchange for occasional full days without students in the classroom.
The discussion, which stretched into the late evening hours, proved inconclusive. It will continue at a regular board meeting on March 10, when the calendar for next school year is up for approval again. Following the resignation of board member Mandy Roberts, a split vote is possible.
Each alternative the board reviewed came with its own list of tangled pros and cons. Still, Nichols emphasized that as a remote school district, it should take advantage of opportunities for cross-school teacher mentorship and professional development. She called on the idea of teacher efficacy, and said she believed that time for collaboration leads to better instruction in the classroom.
“When we believe that we can make an impact on kids, we are better,” Nichols told the board.
The first option Nichols shared was moving early release to Fridays. The switch would help teachers avoid a break in routine for elementary students, and benefit high school athletes, who often need to leave class before 1:45 p.m. to make it to faraway sports games. It may also mean a decreased need for substitute teachers who fill in for staff who coach, or need to leave early for weekend travel.
But with this weekly schedule, educators may lose a time slot for lesson planning or professional development. It's not uncommon for colleagues to head out of town early on Friday afternoon for a medical appointment, to beat incoming weather or to coach a sports game out of town. She also worried that families will find less reason to prioritize Friday attendance, something the district has already struggled with since the pandemic.
Moving to a four-day week schedule came with a number of similar positives, but could mean longer school days or school years to meet the state’s minimum requirement for classroom hours. It may also “radically” increase child care needs and create a 20% reduction in essential services for students, especially those with challenging circumstances at home, Nichols said.
The school board also considered removing early release entirely, and setting roughly one full day a month aside for teachers to work without students in the classroom. A draft calendar placed most of these teacher workdays on Fridays. This option, while it preserved time for teachers, created “stutter weeks” for students, with a mixture of five-day, four-day and three-day weeks — depending on how holidays and breaks fell.
While it remains an option, Nichols did not recommend different schedules for Gunnison and Crested Butte schools. The early-release schedule, consistent district-wide, has become a “unifying” structure, creating time for curriculum training, data dives, special service provider teams and shared leadership, Nichols said. So far, the impact of the early release structure on teachers has been overwhelmingly positive.
“What prompted this move was so many different struggles that we had before ...This [early release] was landed on after really intense reflection, listening and voices saying we've got to do something different, or we can't continue,” Nichols said.
None of the options presented on Monday night checked all of the boxes. Half the board stood by the continuation and continual improvement of the early-release schedule, while board members Jody Coleman and Mark VanderVeer still pressed for change, sooner rather than later. The board wondered if there were lessons to be learned from the North Valley, or by narrowing down the list of alternatives.
“It's palpable to me — in the elementary school in Gunnison — the stress, anxiety and the fracturedness of the school week from those teachers,” Coleman said. She has continued to reach out to students, faculty and parents for feedback. “They’ve tried this for four years and it’s a nightmare”
(Bella Biondini can be contacted at 970.641.1414 or bella@gunnisontimes.com.)
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