Is it Time for Year Round School?

This morning I was reading the Land O' Lakes Patch site and I came across . She asked her readers for their opinions on the length of Pasco County Schools Winter Break: Was it too long?

The question Kelli asked sparked me to pose a question, to all of you, that I have been asking some of my friends and neighbors for quite some time. My question is this: Is it time for our public schools (K through 12) to move to a year round school calendar?

I say yes, but if we are not prepared to make the change, I advocate that at a minimum we should engage in a serious dialogue with each other and our school officials about modifying the current public school calendar. 

As I understand it, the current school calendar that is used by the majority of public schools throughout these United States is historically tied to farming, specifically the planting, growing and harvesting seasons of the Northern and Midwestern states. Children attended school in the winter when there was little to do on the farm. School was stopped in the spring in time for the planting season and it resumed in the fall once the bulk of the crops have been harvested. Farming families needed every hand available to help produce the crops, so a school calendar was adopted that satisfied the needs of these farming families.

Let's fast forward to today. The United States is no longer a farming-based economy. I challenge that our public school calendar should not be tied to a way of life that the overwhelming majority of us no longer live. 

There is also no escaping the reality that dual income families are the norm in today’s American society. More than 60 percent of families with children under age 18 had both parents employed outside the home in 2005-2006, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. I suspect that number is even larger today. That compares to less than a third of mothers working outside the home in 1975. 

With both Mom and Dad at work all day, I have the serious concern that more children than we are willing to admit are home alone without proper supervision during the extended summer break, because parents cannot find and/or afford proper child care. 

I am not an educator, but I would assume that eliminating extended month breaks would result in students not having to review or re-learn items from the previous school year when returning to classes in the fall, thus making the time that our children are in school more productive.

With every issue there is a financial element to consider. It does not make financial sense to me to have millions and millions of dollars of building, equipment and resources setting idle for three months of the year. The buildings and busses have to be maintained regardless of whether school is in session or not.

Why are they are sitting idle?

We also face the issue of overcrowding in some of our school districts. With creative scheduling and year round use of school district resources, I maintain we will be able to accommodate more students without building new schools. 

With these issues in mind, again I ask the question, should we consider a year round school calendar?

The current school calendar provides for approximately 40 weeks of school and 12 weeks of breaks (this includes spring, Christmas and summer break). Here is a link to a year round calendar that I would advocate:  http://www.nayre.org/Fairfield-Suisun,%20CA%20school_calendar_07_08[1].pdf

This calendar essentially provides for a two week fall break, scheduled around the Thanksgiving holiday. A two week Christmas break, a three week spring break and a five week summer break with graduation scheduled in the “normal” June time frame. 

I wonder if I am the lone voice in the woods asking this question or if there are others out there that would like to challenge our school officials to visit this topic?

Am I that lone voice? 

In the spirit of full disclosure, I am not a school teacher, administrator nor are any of my immediate family members. I am a parent with a child in the public school system.