HONOLULU -- Federal Judge David Ezra on Thursday afternoon ruled that he will not halt furloughs at Hawaii public schools at least for the next two Fridays.

The judge said he was concerned that school staff could not be notified in time that the furlough was off and that would mean thousands of students being dropped off at school without anyone there to watch them.

"I will not issue an order that puts children in jeopardy," Ezra said.

"It's what I expected. I didn't expect that they were going to be able to open schools tomorrow, but I think hopefully the state got a warning that it's important, that we all feel its important that the kids are in school," public school parent Crystal Shaffner said.

"I think what the judge did was very prudent in thinking about the safety of the children," Schools Superintendent Patricia Hamamoto said.

The legal fight is not over yet. The judge ordered them all back to court on Nov. 5, where he will hear much more substantial arguments about whether the furloughs violate special and regular education students rights to an education.

Hawaii public schools face 17 days of closures because of the furloughs to which teachers agreed as part of their new contract.

Two attorneys filed lawsuits on Wednesday trying to block the furloughs.

Gov. Linda Lingle, Hamamoto and Hawaii State Teachers Association President Ron Okabe met on Tuesday night to discuss expanding educational instruction time in schools. Some days are scheduled as short days to give teachers preparation time. The idea is to add a few minutes to each of these days.

The Department of Education has instructed all teachers and administrators, basically any Hawaii State Teachers Association or Hawaii Government Employees Association union members, to stay off of campus on furlough days, KITV 4 has learned.

The DOE wants to fully implement the guidelines that determine what a furlough day is, Kalani High School Principal Gerald Teramai said. He told his staff about the department's instructions earlier this week.

Some of his teachers were hoping to come in and grade papers and prepare for upcoming lessons, Teramai said.

"Even though they weren't going to get paid, some of them would want to come to school. So, they were a little disappointed that they couldn't report to school on furlough Fridays," Teramai said.

As it stands, only the blue-collar workers, the janitors and cafeteria workers, will be reporting to work at the public schools. Their union, the United Public Workers, is still in negotiations with the state.