Explain ridiculously early 2023/24 start date?

[Anonymous]

Shorter summer=more small breaks during the school year=more vacays during the off-season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be no school in July or August.

Let kids be kids FFS.

You mean no school in June and July.

School starting in mid August is ideal.

Going to school in June is a waste of time and nice weather.

No, July and August. Summer.

Many school facilities have insufficient HVAC so August is terrible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There should be no school in July or August.

Let kids be kids FFS.

You mean no school in June and July.

School starting in mid August is ideal.

Going to school in June is a waste of time and nice weather.

No, July and August. Summer.

Many school facilities have insufficient HVAC so August is terrible.

Agreed. As I said before, it’s too damn hot in august to have to go to school. June is fine. August and July are SUMMER and it’s a SUMMER break. Pp is correct. There shouldn’t be any school in July and August.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Shorter summer=more small breaks during the school year=more vacays during the off-season.

Yes, what a wonderful treat to have off November 3-7 for an affordable trip to the DE beaches. 🥶

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HS sports tryouts and sports have already begun for my 2 oldest.

For us, school has "started" already (can't plan vacations, have to be home at X time, back and forth to school, etc).

So yea, a super early school date pushes everything super forward

Right. People who like the early August start date and don't mind short summers likely have young kids still. Once you get to high school age you see how much sports and music and internships and camps cut into the summer. Not to mention trying to get a summer job when you're only out of school for 9 weeks. If your kid does a spring sport or swimming they are likely going through the end of July. And if they do a fall sport or marching band they are starting back up now. Hopefully they don't do both!

Yep. Fall sports started YESTERDAY, July 31. And don't say "don't do sports" b/c we can easily say "Don't do AP classes." And sports is just as valid -for enrichment, exercise, staying out of trouble- as School. And my kid, ftr, does both.

What a positively asinine statement. DCUM sports parents are truly nuts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IF you want

Full 2 weeks + for Xmas break, (used to be 10 days, now it's more like 14-16 days)

+

Wed-Fri off at Tgiving (used to be only Thurs. and Fri. off with early release on Wed.)

+

A bunch of religious days off

+

ALL the federal holidays off

+

Full week for spring break

... well, at some point you are going to have start earlier and end later just to fit in something close to the required amount of hours.

You don't get to eat your piece of cake and save it at the same time. So, we start earlier and end later with a lot of messed up weeks in between.

I don't want all of these!! I don't want Veteran's Day, I don't want religious holidays (Including tying spring break to Easter), and I don't need a 17 day holiday break.

The problem is that the school board keeps asking. And of course every answers that they want every possible day off plus to get out in early June and start in late August. Just stop asking through these stupid surveys and make a calendar that makes sense.

Agreed! I'd prefer my kids in school on Veteran's Day, maybe do an assembly with veterans for speakers or something. And Indigenous People's Day. And winter break is way too long.

LOL.Luckily it’s not about what you personally “prefer.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hate it. One week before Labor Day is fine. Beyond that and you pretty much lose August as a vacation month. Same for June. Beyond 1.5 weeks takes away that month as a vacation month. Plus the water in the pools is colder then. With all the activities starting in August, it makes sense to have 8 weeks free of activities for families to actually have a break from school.

YOU HAVE THREE FULL WEEKS in August to vacate and that isn't enough for you? You can't make a vacation to fit in a three week period? I think that's a planning or mental failure on your part, not a failure of the school calendar.

No school sports are in August

Oh well. That’s your choice then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hate it. One week before Labor Day is fine. Beyond that and you pretty much lose August as a vacation month. Same for June. Beyond 1.5 weeks takes away that month as a vacation month. Plus the water in the pools is colder then. With all the activities starting in August, it makes sense to have 8 weeks free of activities for families to actually have a break from school.

YOU HAVE THREE FULL WEEKS in August to vacate and that isn't enough for you? You can't make a vacation to fit in a three week period? I think that's a planning or mental failure on your part, not a failure of the school calendar.

Except that if you have kids in fall sports in HS, that started yesterday.

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[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We don't have to do 180 days - we could use hours but the SB insists on doing 180 days.
We have two weeks off for winter break and one week off for spring break and many religious holidays - those days all add up to elongate the calendar.
We used to start post-Labor Day which I liked. The SB wanted to change it for really no legitimate reason - & at the time claimed that moving the start before labor day would help with AP prep and SOL prep. The dumb thing was that SOL prep was already backloaded as much as possible so it made no difference to move the calendar up for that and it was a real red herring in the whole decision- leaving only AP test prep affected - and those same kids are the same ones likely with less time now to work on the common app before school starts - so it's all a wash for them anyway.

Literally every year when they do these surveys, the majority want an August start. So everyone clamoring about Labor Day, most parents wanted an August start.

Some....I have talked to many that want after Labor Day start or to get out earlier.

“You have talked to?” Mmkay. Read the published results of the survey.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Simply don’t understand it. Raised in PA. Started school the day after Labor Day, had Columbus and Veterans days off, Thanksgiving, Friday after Thanksgiving and the following Monday (first day of hunting season) off in the fall. Two week break at Christmas, both Presidents birthdays in February, spring break week at Easter and out no later than June10th.

No teacher in service days, no days of at the end of the quarter, no CRT training, etc. All teacher training, usually a week or less, done in August.

Worked fine then, could work now.

Really? Can't you just give it a rest? Come on.

I heard they do try to do some crt/brainwashing nothing. Is this not true?

Yawn. Troll score: -1,000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But the highest positive response was for ONE week before labor day and none of the next three years has that.

We’re also not seeing what they voted for for the end of the year, which impacts the start of the year. In recent surveys most families wanted a later start and an earlier end, which is not exactly feasible.

Sure it is. We’ve explained how so many times. An easy way to cut days off the end is to get rid of all of the teacher workdays and PD days. Have school on Veteran’s Day, with an assembly, once again and have school the day before Thanksgiving. That’s at least a week if not more right there. -teacher

Aww, it’s so precious how you think you’ve figured it all out.

It’s not going to happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:But the highest positive response was for ONE week before labor day and none of the next three years has that.

We’re also not seeing what they voted for for the end of the year, which impacts the start of the year. In recent surveys most families wanted a later start and an earlier end, which is not exactly feasible.

Sure it is. We’ve explained how so many times. An easy way to cut days off the end is to get rid of all of the teacher workdays and PD days. Have school on Veteran’s Day, with an assembly, once again and have school the day before Thanksgiving. That’s at least a week if not more right there. -teacher

Different Teacher here- the extra PD days is what elongates the calendar. Most school districts do not have this.

I would make Columbus/Veteran’s Day school days. I would also get rid of like 2-3 PD days.

Just looking at the calendar this year…
If Columbus Day was a student day, and May 3 and one of the days after Spring Break, we could end the SY on Friday June 7.

For 24/25
Taking away Two PD days in Oct(1 being Columbus) and Veteran’s Day the last day could be Friday, June 6.

For 25/26
This calendar ends late June 17, but if you took away Columbus Day, Veteran’s Day and another PD day you could end school on Friday June 12.

The gist is, just 3 days makes a huge difference.

I am telling you- they need teachers to make the calendars. 🤣

All of this and remove all the unnecessary religious holidays and we're good.

[Anonymous]

Mid June til after Labor Day is ideal. 10 school days off for winter/Christmas break, 5 school days off for spring break, add a fall break for 3 school days/5 day weekend. Get rid of all random holidays like Veterans Day, Columbus Day, etc. Done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes it is true that many never go on vacation...but why should only the super rich who can pay premium prices be able to go? We can't even visit family over thanksgiving the flight prices are too high.

So yes, I suppose I can do a driving trip to visit family in august, but it would be nice if every once in awhile I can take my family to a resort in the off season (August).

It is positively inane that people are arguing that school calendars should be made to maximize their ability to go to a “resort.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FCPS needs to tighten up its schedule. Yes, teachers have more administrative work than in the past but they have been doing it for years now. Judicious use of subs would allow teachers to do all the additional non-teaching functions during their regular work day.

Maybe the overhead at Gatehouse could help lighten the load for teachers rather than create more work for the front line teachers.

The need to start early to do well on AP exams is a weak excuse. Many states still start the day after Labor Day, have adequate school breaks and kids that receive 4s and 5s on AP exams on a regular basis.

Kids in fall sports have always started in August and families have arranged vacation schedules accordingly.

Inability to adopt a sensible calendar, yet another reason why FCPS is continuing its downward slide.

Many states do not start after Labor Day.

Only a few start that late.

The vast majority of states start in August and finish in mid/late May through very early June.

And yes, 2 extra weeks at the beginning of the year would help tremendously with AP classes, particularly rigorous classes like AP Chemistry, the AP math classes and Music Theory.

Really, the AP course is emulating a semester college course that is 16 or 17 weeks in length. So the class with the AP exam in May is moving at most at half speed. So no those 2 weeks don’t matter for anyone taking APs that is going on to college.