Is there ANY way to put the genie back in the bottle re: all of the religious holidays off?

[Anonymous]

Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

Because fcps wants to prevent associations with Christian things

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

It makes the most sense to align it with the end of 3rd quarter, honestly. Then it's fixed. Ideally winter break could align with the end of the semester, but there's SO much history tying it to Christmas nationwide I think you'd have to move the whole calendar to make that happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

They had the Monday after Easter off for a teacher workday. Why couldn't you fly home on Monday?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

Decades ago, before every religious holiday was a day off, people fussed about Good Friday. Christians wanted it off but others said there shouldn't be religious holidays (Christmas is a federal holiday so that doesn't really come into play). FCPS thought they were being clever and declared that Spring Break would always be the week before Easter so they didn't have to decide one way or the other. It was a school holiday but not specifically for religious reasons.

Seems dumb now that they can just say "we close for all major religious holidays."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

Decades ago, before every religious holiday was a day off, people fussed about Good Friday. Christians wanted it off but others said there shouldn't be religious holidays (Christmas is a federal holiday so that doesn't really come into play). FCPS thought they were being clever and declared that Spring Break would always be the week before Easter so they didn't have to decide one way or the other. It was a school holiday but not specifically for religious reasons.

Seems dumb now that they can just say "we close for all major religious holidays."

The Christians didn't fuss or ask to have Good Friday off.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one is thinking about the low income and ESL students who need consistent support to make progress against their educational goals.

You think you are, but have no research and the research that is out there says it doesn’t matter WHEN, but it does matter how many hours.

Show us that research. There is no research that says hours, no matter how incinsistently applied, is the same as a consistent schedule. You're misinterpreting research on alternative schedules.

I already did in at least of these threads. The main research said 180 days is 180 days and the TIME in school matters over placement of the days.
All other research about extending the school year and adding breaks is mixed. Feel free to find the link I already posted in an easy to watch PBS segment or do more research yourself and post that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We certainly had a better education system when we only recognized Christian holidays. Even the reprobates at NYSE and CME take off Good Friday.

Lots of Muslim countries if you prefer that vibe.

We don’t “recognize” Jewish holidays. We just have them off because there aren’t enough teachers to teach on those days.

I believe that the actual issue was that schools noticed a large attendance issue around the Muslim holidays, including teachers and IAs being absent. The schools moved to figure out how to address that. Once they started the process to have the Muslim holidays as days off, due to attendance issues, other religions chimed in that you cannot give off a Muslim holiday without recognizing their holidays even though there had not been an attendance issue on the Jewish, Hundi, and Greek Orthodox holidays. It turned into an all or nothing scenario. But only one of the holidays actually had a real attendance issue tied to it.

There was no such data ever presented. Random days in the school year had higher absentee rates (both students and staff) than any of the newly added religious holidays.

Actually, yes, the data WAS presented. They communicated data from several years worth of religious holidays and the number of students (cant remember about staff) that were absent. They then ranked the holidays with the highest rate of absenteeism. That is the data that was considered when determining days off.

Completely wrong. The data didn't show that and it certainly wasn't used in determining what religious holidays to add.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We certainly had a better education system when we only recognized Christian holidays. Even the reprobates at NYSE and CME take off Good Friday.

Lots of Muslim countries if you prefer that vibe.

We don’t “recognize” Jewish holidays. We just have them off because there aren’t enough teachers to teach on those days.

This is completely untrue.

Fcps does not have a significant number of Jewish teachers or cafeteria staff.

I am Christian (and don't get any holidays off other than "winter" break). It would be completely wrong to celebrate multiple Muslim holidays and not celebrate the Jewish high holidays.

Winter break and spring break are both tied to Christian holidays, so it's disingenuous to say you don't get Christian holidays off in this calendar. You get 2 full weeks for Christmas and a week for Easter.

LOL, keep telling yourself that. Christmas is one day, not two weeks. And Easter is always on a Sunday.

[Anonymous]

The teachers want the two week spring break and FCPS gave it to them years ago. Before that we had a week or a little more for winter break, depending on where Christmas fell. That was plenty and a shorter winter break can help the school year end earlier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one is thinking about the low income and ESL students who need consistent support to make progress against their educational goals.

You think you are, but have no research and the research that is out there says it doesn’t matter WHEN, but it does matter how many hours.

Show us that research. There is no research that says hours, no matter how incinsistently applied, is the same as a consistent schedule. You're misinterpreting research on alternative schedules.

I already did in at least of these threads. The main research said 180 days is 180 days and the TIME in school matters over placement of the days.
All other research about extending the school year and adding breaks is mixed. Feel free to find the link I already posted in an easy to watch PBS segment or do more research yourself and post that.

So trust that you have posted it and that you know how to understand it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The teachers want the two week spring break and FCPS gave it to them years ago. Before that we had a week or a little more for winter break, depending on where Christmas fell. That was plenty and a shorter winter break can help the school year end earlier.

Getting rid of the random days off is a way better solution to shortening the school year than adding a silly 2-day week right before the winter break where only half the kids are there anyways and none of the kids are paying attention because they're all ready for break.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nobody thinks spring break tied to Easter is a good idea. I’m a devout Christian and dislike having that week as spring break. We care about celebrating Easter which means we have to come home early for spring break so as to avoid traveling on Easter. I think the problem with moving it is it’s harder to align with other jurisdictions. ‘Everyone’ probably could agree that spring break should be at the end of the 3rd quarter, but different school systems have different dates for the end of the 3rd quarter. Tying spring break to Easter makes to easier to align with neighboring jurisdictions.

Same. We're religious and traveled to family for Spring Break. I had to travel home on actual Easter instead of being able to spend it with family or attend Easter services. I would like Spring break to be any week but Easter week actually.

Why isn't Easter weekend the first weekend of Spring break?

It makes the most sense to align it with the end of 3rd quarter, honestly. Then it's fixed. Ideally winter break could align with the end of the semester, but there's SO much history tying it to Christmas nationwide I think you'd have to move the whole calendar to make that happen.

At this point it's not even about tying it to Christmas but matching the same time that all your family and relatives have off from work and school, even those in other parts of the country and much of the world. That's the week my work is shut down. That's the week that work slows down for my husband and he can take time off. That's the week that cousins are available for a visit. It's a time the whole country steps back. You can't just randomly choose a different set of weeks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We certainly had a better education system when we only recognized Christian holidays. Even the reprobates at NYSE and CME take off Good Friday.

Lots of Muslim countries if you prefer that vibe.

We don’t “recognize” Jewish holidays. We just have them off because there aren’t enough teachers to teach on those days.

This is completely untrue.

Fcps does not have a significant number of Jewish teachers or cafeteria staff.

I am Christian (and don't get any holidays off other than "winter" break). It would be completely wrong to celebrate multiple Muslim holidays and not celebrate the Jewish high holidays.

Winter break and spring break are both tied to Christian holidays, so it's disingenuous to say you don't get Christian holidays off in this calendar. You get 2 full weeks for Christmas and a week for Easter.

LOL, keep telling yourself that. Christmas is one day, not two weeks. And Easter is always on a Sunday.

I would argue that we don’t really get Easter off since you to travel back on Easter Monday.

I don’t celebrate Easter.

This is a public school system that should serve the public - not every religion out there. We are punishing the whole to benefit a few.