Academic performance does not correlate with instructional time

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Hawaii - complete report

The amount of instructional time offered at elementary schools statewide varies widely —from 4 1⁄3 to six hours on average each day — but there appears to be no correlation between campuses with shorter school days and those meeting annual learning benchmarks, new state data show.

Twelve of the 37 schools that offer school days of at least five hours, five minutes on average, the minimum expected to go into effect next school year, did not meet adequate yearly math and reading proficiency goals in 2010 under the No Child Left Behind law, according to statistics compiled by the state Department of Education.

But dozens of schools that were below the minimums did meet the benchmarks, including Moanalua Elementary, which has the second-shortest day of Hawaii public elementary schools.

That campus gives students an average of four hours, 21 minutes of instruction per day.

DOE administrators say the statistics, released as parents and lawmakers are pushing to lengthen Hawaii's school day, illustrate that more instructional time doesn't necessarily translate into sizable learning gains — or mean students at schools with fewer instructional hours are falling behind. More important, they argue, is not the number of hours students get in classrooms, but whether they are getting high-quality instruction.