JACKSON TWP — The Seneca Valley School District will not have to start the 2016-17 school year a week or more early to accommodate roadwork.

The school board Monday night approved a 2016-17 calendar that has Aug. 24 as the first student day and May 31 as the final student day.

Superintendent Tracy Vitale told the board in January that the administration was looking at starting classes in the second or third week of August so school would be out by June 1.

The state Department of Transportation plans in 2017 to replace the bridge on Seneca School Road near the secondary campus and will reduce it to one lane of traffic during the summer.

Several parents had expressed concerns about school possibly starting early next year, Vitale said Monday.

One way the district was able to condense the calendar was by scheduling only two snow make-up days and planning to use up to three flexible instruction days where students work on assignments at home.

If the district has no snow days, the two make up days will become holidays. If it has more than two snow days, the third, fourth and fifth cancellations will be flexible instruction days.

The district on Feb. 12 held a test run of the new flexible days. The district this week will send out surveys to both parents and students in grades 5 through 12 to get feedback on how they thought that test day went. The principals also will gather feedback from the teachers.

Initial comments from students and teachers has been positive, though the district received one e-mail from a parent who had concerns, Vitale said.

Using the flexible days for emergency cancellations will require teachers to plan ahead.

“The teachers were pleased with the amount of planning that went into it to get this first day in a planned scenario and now they’re thinking through ‘how can I trigger this at 5:30 in the morning?’” she said.