Bethlehem Area School Board members discussed the pending 2016-17 academic calendar, as well as other items at the human resource committee meeting Monday evening at the Education Center in North Bethlehem.

Due to committee chair Rogelio Ortiz feeling under the weather, BASD Superintendent Dr. Joseph Roy ran the human resources meeting. He acknowledged the calendar immediately.

“The calendar works pretty well for the district. We stayed similar the last couple of years,” Roy said. The school district intends to start the 2016-17 academic year before Labor Day on Sept. 5.

Board member Eugene McKeon questioned the process of coming up with the academic calendar.

“Do we try and coordinate calendars with other school districts?” he asked.

Roy quickly responded, stating the administration talks with the Saucon Valley and Northampton school districts to keep consistency.

Later in the meeting, chief human resources officer Russell Giordano spoke about the substitute teacher policies in the district, and their improvements. Specifically, he said the fill rates are improving in BASD and the number of subs has increased, thanks to the approval of the board, making more substitutes available in the buildings.

“It’s better than it was, it’s not perfect,” Giordano said. He said the district hopes to renew the substitute agreement that was approved by the board, while adding more finite details to the plan. Giordano said he hopes to submit the revised plan in the coming months for board review and approval.

“I want to thank you for being so supportive of this process,” he said to the board.

The issue regarding the substitute teachers arose when potential subs realized they could make significantly more money working in other districts, so it became harder to find available subs. A plan tpreviously approved by the board has contributed to fixing this issue, and BASD buildings now have subs that consistently work in those schools.