Kids Unlimited Academy boasts the earliest regular start date of any school in Southern Oregon, but for its third year on the year-round schedule, the Medford charter school is giving everyone at the school an extra half-hour before classes start.

The public charter school shifted its bell schedule an extra 30 minutes for the 2024-25 school year, which started last Wednesday, meaning that the school’s regular start time is now 9 a.m. and 9:30 a.m. on late-start Wednesdays.

In contrast, regular Medford School District elementary schools start at 7:55 a.m. daily with an early dismissal on Wednesdays. School starts Aug. 26 in the district.

According to Kids Unlimited founder Tom Cole, the new school schedule is part of an effort to better serve the needs of its preschool and elementary students.

“Not every institution is able to change itself,” Cole said. “We’ve been able to pilot projects by recognizing needs.”

Despite the later start for instruction time, its doors will still open at 7:30 a.m. to accommodate the needs of working families served by the school’s 10-hour days. Nearly all of the school’s 540 students experience poverty, all qualify for free meals and approximately 70% come from Latino households.

Students who arrive before classes start can eat a freshly prepared breakfast before participating in “morning enrichment” activities, including a new movement class with DJ Gemineye, others focused on dance or mindfulness, and more academic-focused programs for older students that include explorations on robotics, screen printing and multimedia.

Principal Lindsay Ochs highlighted new additions for the school year that include a new science and nutrition component being added to its garden program.

“They love it,” Ochs said.

Ochs said that her administrative team focused heavily on student attendance data and the time kids needed to transition into the day to be ready to learn during morning enrichment time. She said kids showing up for only 10 minutes of mindfulness or movement classes weren’t getting the same benefits as those who showed up earlier.

Kids Unlimited Academy staff compiled data on the times students were arriving at school, when they were eating breakfast and how many minutes students were tardy. Ochs said some of their students don’t always have regular bedtimes.

“We just knew the kids here needed something different,” Ochs said.

Conversations for moving the schedule back began with families and faculty in January, according to Ochs. The board made its decision for the new schedule in March.

“It wasn’t just thrown on people,” Ochs said.

Cole said that being a data-driven decision allows them to monitor results in real time.

“We don’t have to guess whether it’s working,” Cole said.

Another benefit, according to Cole, is that the extra time will allow teachers more time to work with parents in the morning, but the later start time didn’t work for every teacher. For instance, one teacher had a young family and the time change did not work with her husband’s work schedule.

“To be transparent, it wasn’t for everyone,” Cole said. “The overwhelming majority were bought in.”

Kids Unlimited began 27 years ago with a focus on after-school programs and wraparound services for underserved youth. It opened its academy as a public charter school in 2013. It added a pre-kindergarten program in 2019.

Kids Unlimited Academy’s year-round start time — running Aug. 7 through June 13 — is a rarity in Oregon and Southern Oregon. The only other schools that currently advertise a year-round schedule in Oregon are Outlook Christian School in Salem and Victory Academy in Sherwood. St. Mary’s School in Medford, however, offers a year-round option through an eighth “module” in August atop the seven modules that make up the standard school year starting

Aug. 22.