Ninety-five public schools have applied to turn teacher training days into instructional days and restore some of the class time students are losing to furloughs.

The state Board of Education must approve the requests and is expected to do so on Thursday, education officials said.

"Any request that adds instructional days back to the calendar will be looked upon favorably," said state Board of Education Chairman Garrett Toguchi.

The BOE, teachers and Gov. Linda Lingle agreed in September to a new contract that included 17 furlough days, equal to a 7.9 percent pay cut. The furlough days are all scheduled for Fridays and have reduced the number of instructional days to 163, the lowest in the nation.

Individual schools can boost their instructional days by opting to teach kids on what would have been teacher planning days.

Schools receive a total of six "waiver and professional development days" a year — two waiver days and four planning and collaboration days, according to the Hawaii State Teachers Association contract. But following the decision to furlough public school teachers, principals and teachers expressed interest in converting the non-instructional days to school days.

Requests to cancel waiver days or planning days must go before a campus's School Community Council and requires consensus of teachers or a two-thirds vote, according to the HSTA contract. If endorsed at the school level, the request then goes before a four-member panel of the BOE and the Hawaii State Teachers Association and then the full board for final approval.

Superintendent Patricia Hamamoto has extended the deadline for schools to submit requests for exemption from their waiver days to Nov. 13 because dozens of schools were unable to meet the initial deadline in October.

So far, conversion of waiver and professional development days to instructional days has been the only option available to schools to add school days back to their pared-down calendar.

Cindy Giorgis, principal of Hahaione Elementary School, said the school is requesting that two collaboration days and one waiver day be canceled to add three instructional days. The school had already used its other three days earlier in the year.

"The teachers, right off the bat, decided to give that up," she said. "They're really a dedicated group, and they have a clear vision in their mind about what they want their kids to know and when they should know it. Losing 17 days muddies that picture."

Giorgis said the school has also restored days to the calendar in other ways. Usually Hahaione allots two full school days to parent-teacher conferences. Those days were converted back to instructional days and instead teachers will schedule conferences with parents, or vice versa, as needed.

"It's hard to justify taking up any more class time," she said.

Jill Zodrow, education specialist with the DOE's School Community Council office, said many schools have already taken a portion of their waiver or planning days. Only a handful were requesting exemptions from all six.

"Most schools used some days already. It's ordinary for schools to schedule staff development in the beginning of the school year," Zodrow said.

Zodrow said she expects many more schools will seek exemptions by the Nov. 13 deadline.

"We wanted to allow the schools the time necessary to include all of their stakeholders," she said.

At Hokulani Elementary School, principal Alfredo Carganilla said the school is seeking to convert its two waiver days to instructional days. The school has already taken three planning days and the one remaining planning day lands on a furlough Friday.

Carganilla said teachers and the school community council were overwhelmingly in favor of submitting the request to the board.

"Two days seem so insignificant, but those two days are so enormous," he said. "We're trying to lessen the impact of the furloughs. That's what we're looking at."

Carganilla said teachers are challenged with providing five days of instruction in the shortened four-day weeks.

"It is especially hard for our kids who don't get it. When you're looking at the proficiency standards, teachers are working harder," he said.