SLEEPY EYE — The normal school day at Sleepy Eye High School runs from 8:20a.m. to 3:20 p.m. That schedule might be modified if conditions due to energy-saving, daylight saving time put into effect Sunday warrant a change. Supt. Ben Trochlil said a plan would be reviewed this week concerning a later starting time.

Trochlil said over the weekend: “We are not trying to make any changes right now. We will review a new plan this week and see the impact of it. If there seems to be a need for a change, we’ll do it. We’ll have a plan ready if we feel a change is necessary.”

The first-year superintendent heard reports last week that his homeland of Cloquet had to close school due to 30 below zero temperatures. As of latest reports, many of the local and neighboring schools weren’t changing their daily routine, and most would wait and see of the initial effects of the later-rising sun. In Wisconsin, he heard that about 10 percent were starting later.

“We don’t know the effects,” Trochlil said of D.S.T. “We are playing it by ear for the time being. It won’t last that long, as the days are getting longer. I don’t think the parents or we know what it’ll be like. We’ll stay like we are to get a feel of it first.”

As of the weekend past, Trochlil said he received no calls from parents about a possible change, although some of the school board members did. He added that he will confer with St. Mary’s, St. John’s and Leavenworth before a final decision.

Also of concern is the recent sub-zero temps. Earlier the board passed a resolution with the suggestion listed that school would not be held on days with the mercury lower that 15 below. Trochlil said that is an alternative, “but we need heat so it doesn’t make any difference.”

He is concerned about students arriving at school by any means of transportation, especially by bus, in the non-lighted hours. “I tried visualizing it for the kids,”Trochlil said, “and it’s kinda dark even 20 minutes before eight (o’clock). I talked with Warren Marti (bus owner) in December and he was concerned about it then.”

Trochlil’s only new year’s resolution was for “trying to get community involvement”in SEHS and education overall. “Our big thing is our master plan, community project,” he noted. “I’d like to have everybody working together.”

The New Ulm Daily Journal,

Jan. 11, 1974