Pinellas school start time debate hinges on choice, bus rides

Largo — Florida lawmakers gave school districts until 2026 to revamp their schedules so middle and high schools students can get more sleep before classes. But changing start times to meet the state law won’t be as easy as just flipping schools’ schedules around, Pinellas County district officials said during a Tuesday workshop. The endeavor involves the unpacking of several layers, not the least of which are student transportation and school choice programs, to create a system that runs efficiently and doesn’t break the bank, superintendent Kevin Hendrick told the school board. If the district were simply to move elementary schools to the earliest start time, with high schools next and middle schools last, the upshot would be the need for another 50 bus drivers at a cost of close to $3 million, deputy superintendent Stephanie Woodford said. Some alterations to the district’s application programs, such as magnet and fundamental schools, could help ease the load, Woodford said.

Ideas that have been discussed as possibilities include cutting bus rides to some of the programs, creating stricter zones for admission to certain programs and creating flexible start time schedules. “We’re not trying to be alarmists,” Hendrick said. “We have to be realists. ” He noted that currently, high school bus routes for certain programs can run as long as nearly two hours each way. Because high schools start early in the morning, before traffic congestion worsens, they’d likely get longer as high schools begin classes at the height of rush hour.

One key question that needs answers from the community, Woodford said, is: “What is too long of a bus ride for choice? ” Along with that, she added, the district needs to know what types of programs, if any, parents would be willing to drive their children to attend. The issues aren’t easy ones, Hendrick said, because the district developed its choice programs haphazardly over decades. Decisions were made for all sorts of different reasons, often without consideration for past actions. Officials don’t want to harm families’ access to choices, either by cutting programs or bus service, without careful consideration — including the possibility of replicating offerings in different parts of the county, Hendrick said.

So while the board is asking lawmakers to reconsider the law so districts can have more flexibility, he said, it also needs to talk about how to cope if no changes come. “We have to start the discussion now,” Hendrick said. Board chairperson Laura Hine said the issue is “huge,” and stressed the importance of hearing from the public early and often. She said the district has talked for nearly eight years about shifting start times to accommodate teen sleep patterns, but frequently faltered. Getting on track now makes sense, board member Dawn Peters said, because several agencies will.