Request By:
Mr. James B. Graham
Superintendent of Public Instruction
Department of Education
Capital Plaza Tower
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Robert L. Chenoweth, Assistant Attorney General
You have asked the Office of the Attorney General to consider KRS 158.060 as it concerns the requirement therein that a minimum of six hours per day of actual school work shall constitute a school day. Your specific question is what activities in the school program constitute "actual school work." You noted this concern was prompted by the language of Senate Bill 198, passed by the 1978 General Assembly, which authorizes an extension of a school day to make up days missed as a result of an emergency and further authorizes school districts that adopted an extended day before such an emergency to count such extension of time upon approval of the State Board for Elementary and Secondary Education as make-up time.
We believe a prior opinion of this office is dispositive of our position of what actually constitutes a school day in Kentucky. In OAG 70-222, copy attached, we stated:
"'[A]ctual school work' as the term is used in KRS 158.060 means instructional hours either of purely academic classroom instruction or reasonably calculated to achieve general educational objectives within such standards for school instructional programs as have been approved by the State Board of Education under its power and authority to prescribe curricula under KRS 156.070."
We also refer you to KRS 156.160(2),(3).
Additionally, referred to in OAG 70-222, is OAG 62-975, copy attached, and the predecessor regulation to 703 KAR 2:010(5). For comparison and support for the conclusion reiterated herein, see KRS 161.720(2) and OAG 76-278, copy attached.