The Boardman school board heard from some parents and students Monday after last month unanimously voting to restructure the district's middle school schedule.
The restructure means going from 42-minute class periods to 56-minute classes and will be focused more on core academics, while cutting time from subjects such as art, health, language and music.
For example, jazz band, orchestra and wind instruction was eliminated while concert band, string orchestra and choir was cut down to three days per week.
"Reduce the amount of days the kids would have instruction from five days to three so you're looking at a 40 percent reduction," said Jake Aron, president of the Boardman band and orchestra parent association.
Students worry that will keep kids from continuing into the nationally respected Boardman High School bands and performance groups.
"Then the jazz band will be hurt too because they're not going to get exposure to it at the middle school level so they might not wanna do it at high school," said sophomore band representative Matthew Zook.
The board said the change was made to keep the district's excellent state report card rating since test scores are lowest at the middle school level.
"We have tried desperately to preserve them all, and the only way to preserve them all was to institute change," board member Kenneth Beraduce said.
"The last thing we want to do is to have the state board come in and take over how we run this school district," board member Dr. Robert DeMarco added.
Still, much of the crowd questioned the motives behind a move to fewer arts and music classes.
"We're rated excellent as far as a school system, we're an outstanding music program, why are changes necessary, it just doesn't to me make sense," Aron said.
The board said it had to act now to start the new schedule next fall. But it anticipates making more changes before they reach an acceptable final version.
