Glenpool Public Schools announces change to bell schedule

With a new state law requiring 40 minutes of recess time during the school day, Glenpool becomes the latest district to alter its bell schedule.

"We added five minutes to the beginning of the day, and five minutes to the end at 3 of our sites, the lower elementary, upper elementary, and intermediate school," Glenpool Public Schools Superintendent Curtis Layton said.

The district announced these new start and end times:

• Lower Elementary: 7:45 am - 2:45 pm
• Upper Elementary: 8:00 am - 3:00 pm
• Intermediate 5th grade: 8:40 am - 3:40 pm
• Intermediate 6th grade: 8:45 am - 3:35 pm
• Middle School: 8:45 am - 3:35 pm
• High School: 8:55 am - 3:45 pm

The changes only affect the elementary and intermediate sites.

WATCH: Glenpool Public Schools announces change to bell schedule

"We had to kind of allow for an extra 20-minute recess in two of our schools, and we wanted to recover some of that classroom time," Layton said. "And so, the most logical way was to add time to the kids' day."

The additional recess time is something both districts and parents are mostly on board with.

"It's a good deal for kids," Layton said. "It's a good deal for their social development, a good deal for them to go out and exercise."

"My child definitely does not function best sitting at a desk," Glenpool parent Ally Schuller said.

Schuller has a son about to be a Glenpool kindergartner. She's staying cautiously optimistic about that change.

"If it's added on to our day, it may just add to the exhaustion, but if it's done differently to where we're just incorporating our play in different ways, or learning in different ways, then I think it's going to be something he would benefit from greatly," Schuller said.

Some parents like Schuller have concerns about that 7:45 am start time for her five-year-old.

"The littlest kids are starting the earliest in the day, and I understand that's for parents to drop off before they go to work," Schuller said. "It's changing bus schedules and all kinds of things."

2 News Oklahoma asked Superintendent Layton about that specifically.

"The feedback we get from our teachers is that our younger kids do better early than our older kids," Layton said. "Our older kids with a later start time, they do better. And then by early afternoon, mid-afternoon, some of our young kids are, you know, they're tapped out."

Parents like Schuller are keeping an open mind.

"I wonder if there maybe were some smoother ways to do the transition," Schuller said. Maybe we can use this as a stepping stone to create better scores for our students."

Layton says there could be more changes to the bell schedule for the 2027-2028 calendar depending on how the state calculates recess time going forward.

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