In an increasing number of states, legislatures are dabbling in the operation of local school districts when it comes to setting the school calendar. Many parents and grassroots organizations applaud it, but how does it affect teachers and schools in terms of providing the best possible educational experience for the students?
(Note: This article is NOT intended as a policy piece for or against the "Save Our Summers" laws that have emerged in recent years, although my opinion will most likely be apparent. My intention is simply to look at how these laws affect how teachers like me and my colleagues.)
More below the fold.
In 1998, when I was a sophomore in high school, my school system in suburban Charlotte decided to follow a trend that had been increasing in the southeastern United States, and moved the first day of school to the first or second week of August. While starting school around August 5 was kind of strange to us at first, there were a few perks. For one, since we were on the four-by-four block scheduling system, we actually got our final exams for our first semester classes done before Christmas. Furthermore, school was over before Memorial Day.
In 2004, though, a grassroots group called Save Our Summers NC (SOS-NC) convinced the North Carolina General Assembly to pass House Bill 1464, later known commonly as the School Calendar Law. Taking effect in the fall of 2005 (which also happens to be when I began teaching in the same school system I attended), all school systems in North Carolina were required to start school no earlier than August 25, and end no later than June 10. According to SOS-NC’s website, their objective is
...to establish, protect and maintain a more traditional school calendar for elementary and secondary schools throughout the state ... [and] to preserve the summer months for outside-the-classroom childhood and family learning experiences.
People can (and have) debated the benefits and drawbacks of this law until they’re blue in the face, but one cannot debate that schools and teachers have had to drastically alter how they do things. Here are a few of the ways:
FEWER TEACHER WORKDAYS. Before the School Calendar Law, workdays were more commonplace. The number of days between the first day of school and the last day of school is on average five days shorter, so that means that workdays were cut out. It’s fairly common for school to be in session for seven or eight weeks at a time with no day off, which makes burnout a big factor. This segues into another point...
NO FLEXIBILITY IN THE SCHEDULE. The Piedmont of North Carolina isn’t exactly upstate New York in terms of winter climate, but we did get some snow this year. In order to keep spring break intact, students were sent to school on a Saturday in early March, and the only teacher workdays in February and March were changed to regular school days, leaving students with more fatigue and teachers with less planning time.
FIRST SEMESTER EXAMS AFTER CHRISTMAS. Block scheduling was introduced in part to create a college-like schedule for students. But I never had to take exams in mid-January when I was in college. Which segues into point number four...
AP CLASSES. I teach AP U.S. History, which is a one-semester class in my school system. My class is in the spring semester, which means that my class this year began on January 26, after first-semester exams. The AP exam is on May 8. I have 68 days to cover everything from Jamestown to 9/11. I could request to have my class scheduled in the first semester, which means I’d have 87 instructional days, but that means that kids would probably forget a lot of information between January and May. One remedy here would be to abolish block scheduling (something I wish they would do), but that’s for another diary.
In years of reading about SOS-NC, I’m not exactly sure what they mean by the "childhood and family learning experiences" that they reference in their objective statement, but one thing that I find clear is that the new school calendar in North Carolina is negatively altering the education of students in several ways. Several bills are currently pending the N.C. General Assembly that would revert control over school calendars back to local school districts, and it would appear that a fight is coming.
So, I’m looking forward to the discussion over this issue. I’m curious as to what other teachers (and maybe even students) think. Should state governments have control over local school districts’ calendars? Does the benefit of having a "traditional summer" outweigh the potential drawbacks? Fire away.