Will DCPS ignore snow days again in June?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

They are just waiting until someone sues. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet by a family with a special needs child.

I dont think parents realize their schools are doing it. They just assume the school is following the rules.

This but there is also a contingent of parents who don't care and actually are happy when there is less school.

This group is larger when there is a debate over something like adding days to the school year for snow days. I remember tons of parents last year lobbying against the snow days because they had vacation plans right after school got out or "whatever it's not like kids learn anything the last week" or just not wanting to deal with school commutes for a couple more days. It's remarkable how many people just don't value education at all and view school as little more than a babysitting service or an annoying obligation. Depressing.

Some might say that adding more days at the end of the school year is a babysitting service, too. You are clinging on to the extra days for what? Stop acting like this is unique to DCPS or modern education. Everyone knows the month of June is a joke. You think you were reading an anthology and having socratic seminars in the 3rd grade on June 15th in the 80's? Stop acting like it's some kind of inequity and just say you need babysitting.

The law is kids are in school for a minimum 180 days. If you don't like, get the law changed. Oh you can't do that? Then shut the fkc up.

You should spend this snow day finding therapy for your internet rage. Are you OK?

The PP is right though. The point is that schools are skirting legal requirements. These are publicly funded schools. It is perfectly reasonable to expect them to fulfill their mandate of having kids in school a certain number of days.

Also, this isn't about childcare for me. I don't personally worry about my kids getting enough days in school -- one of my kid has spent the last day and a half doing a workbook for fun because she loves school so much she assigns herself school even on snow days. But I look at all the kids this district is failing, all the kids who aren't learning to read, are chronically truant, don't graduate high school, and that's why I think we should hold the district to the legal standard. The whole point of public school is to create an educated society. When the attitude is "eh, who cares?" you start to understand why we have so many uneducated and poorly educated people in this city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

They are just waiting until someone sues. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet by a family with a special needs child.

I dont think parents realize their schools are doing it. They just assume the school is following the rules.

This but there is also a contingent of parents who don't care and actually are happy when there is less school.

This group is larger when there is a debate over something like adding days to the school year for snow days. I remember tons of parents last year lobbying against the snow days because they had vacation plans right after school got out or "whatever it's not like kids learn anything the last week" or just not wanting to deal with school commutes for a couple more days. It's remarkable how many people just don't value education at all and view school as little more than a babysitting service or an annoying obligation. Depressing.

Some might say that adding more days at the end of the school year is a babysitting service, too. You are clinging on to the extra days for what? Stop acting like this is unique to DCPS or modern education. Everyone knows the month of June is a joke. You think you were reading an anthology and having socratic seminars in the 3rd grade on June 15th in the 80's? Stop acting like it's some kind of inequity and just say you need babysitting.

Everyone does not know that. It's a defeatist attitude people adopt to justify not making any effort.

I personally think we should switch to year round school with seasonal breaks to avoid this BS.

Is it though? Do you know how many year long parents complain about burning through their PTO? No camps, no programming? And the really rich just get to go on two week vacations every 6-8 weeks.

The system isn't perfect. No system is. It is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. I am sure DCPS will add on the extra days and the parents who already have plans will rage and continue with their life plans. And you will get to send your child to school so they don't miss out on their socratic seminar.

If we switched to year round school there would be camps and programming during the seasonal breaks. Just like right now there are camps and programming in the summer. It would actually be easier to provide coverage. It's often hard to find camps in mid-August around here because a lot of them shut down by the 1st week of August. If we did shorter seasonal breaks instead of a long summer, it might actually be easier to have coverage because you'd only have to find 1-2 week coverage at a time instead of trying to find 8-10 weeks of childcare every summer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

They are just waiting until someone sues. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet by a family with a special needs child.

I dont think parents realize their schools are doing it. They just assume the school is following the rules.

This but there is also a contingent of parents who don't care and actually are happy when there is less school.

This group is larger when there is a debate over something like adding days to the school year for snow days. I remember tons of parents last year lobbying against the snow days because they had vacation plans right after school got out or "whatever it's not like kids learn anything the last week" or just not wanting to deal with school commutes for a couple more days. It's remarkable how many people just don't value education at all and view school as little more than a babysitting service or an annoying obligation. Depressing.

Some might say that adding more days at the end of the school year is a babysitting service, too. You are clinging on to the extra days for what? Stop acting like this is unique to DCPS or modern education. Everyone knows the month of June is a joke. You think you were reading an anthology and having socratic seminars in the 3rd grade on June 15th in the 80's? Stop acting like it's some kind of inequity and just say you need babysitting.

Everyone does not know that. It's a defeatist attitude people adopt to justify not making any effort.

I personally think we should switch to year round school with seasonal breaks to avoid this BS.

Is it though? Do you know how many year long parents complain about burning through their PTO? No camps, no programming? And the really rich just get to go on two week vacations every 6-8 weeks.

The system isn't perfect. No system is. It is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. I am sure DCPS will add on the extra days and the parents who already have plans will rage and continue with their life plans. And you will get to send your child to school so they don't miss out on their socratic seminar.

If we switched to year round school there would be camps and programming during the seasonal breaks. Just like right now there are camps and programming in the summer. It would actually be easier to provide coverage. It's often hard to find camps in mid-August around here because a lot of them shut down by the 1st week of August. If we did shorter seasonal breaks instead of a long summer, it might actually be easier to have coverage because you'd only have to find 1-2 week coverage at a time instead of trying to find 8-10 weeks of childcare every summer.

I assure you, you would find ways to complain about the nontraditional calendar. I taught in a school that had a nontraditional calendar in California and it was great. Great for a teacher. I loved all the breaks. But there were no camps or programming during the 2-3 weeks off. And you do realize that the non traditional calendar is also just 180 days? Except you don't get to benefit from ANY of the summer camps. Outdoor camps, sleepway camps. None of it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

What are the rules? Can you post them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

Paging the Washington Post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

What is the legal minimum standard? So far no one has posted the complete legal requirement. Or the process for a waiver which is also posted.

[Anonymous]

Has anyone looked at how all the Virginia districts that close 10+ days a year sometimes do it without making up a single day?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

What is the legal minimum standard? So far no one has posted the complete legal requirement. Or the process for a waiver which is also posted.

I mean you also have access to the internet so I don't know why you are sitting around waiting for someone else to just provide you with all the relevant information instead of getting it yourself, but I'm used to working with lazy people so here: https://osse.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/osse/page_content/attachments/Instructional%20Day%20Guidance_May2022_0.pdf

The waiver process is extremely loose and basically allows OSSE to waive the requirement any time a school says it has "exigent circumstances." You would think exigent circumstances would be defined to described totally unforeseen issues, but it doesn't. So I guess exigent circumstances could include "we built two snow days into the calendar in the case of snow, and then we had snow, but we just don't feel like extending the school year by two days, so we won't." If that meets the test than virtually anything would. "The kids seem restive, we don't want to deal with them anymore." "We are tired." "I don't know, how important is school really? Seems superfluous."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

Fun fact: There is this thing called google. You can google "dcps calendar" and then the calendar magically appears. So you can look at the calendar and see the two snow days built in making the last day June 23rd. It's pretty amazing. Look at the calendar. Count the number of days of school and you will see 180 days!!! The legal requirement!!!

But gosh, June 23rd is a Monday. Womp womp. Cue in the parents complaining about the vacation they already booked. Take out the Kleenex for the parents who had already signed up for summer camp. I hope central office and principals have cleared out their inboxes for all the sad and angwee emails they are about to get. Lonely tear.

But wait! Maybe we make up our snow days on the PD days! Oh, again, I hope principals and central office clear out their inboxes because families booked a three day trip for that made up day! It's the cheapest time of year to fly to Utah. So angwee. So sad. Boo hoo.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

They are just waiting until someone sues. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet by a family with a special needs child.

I dont think parents realize their schools are doing it. They just assume the school is following the rules.

This but there is also a contingent of parents who don't care and actually are happy when there is less school.

This group is larger when there is a debate over something like adding days to the school year for snow days. I remember tons of parents last year lobbying against the snow days because they had vacation plans right after school got out or "whatever it's not like kids learn anything the last week" or just not wanting to deal with school commutes for a couple more days. It's remarkable how many people just don't value education at all and view school as little more than a babysitting service or an annoying obligation. Depressing.

Some might say that adding more days at the end of the school year is a babysitting service, too. You are clinging on to the extra days for what? Stop acting like this is unique to DCPS or modern education. Everyone knows the month of June is a joke. You think you were reading an anthology and having socratic seminars in the 3rd grade on June 15th in the 80's? Stop acting like it's some kind of inequity and just say you need babysitting.

Everyone does not know that. It's a defeatist attitude people adopt to justify not making any effort.

I personally think we should switch to year round school with seasonal breaks to avoid this BS.

Is it though? Do you know how many year long parents complain about burning through their PTO? No camps, no programming? And the really rich just get to go on two week vacations every 6-8 weeks.

The system isn't perfect. No system is. It is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. I am sure DCPS will add on the extra days and the parents who already have plans will rage and continue with their life plans. And you will get to send your child to school so they don't miss out on their socratic seminar.

If we switched to year round school there would be camps and programming during the seasonal breaks. Just like right now there are camps and programming in the summer. It would actually be easier to provide coverage. It's often hard to find camps in mid-August around here because a lot of them shut down by the 1st week of August. If we did shorter seasonal breaks instead of a long summer, it might actually be easier to have coverage because you'd only have to find 1-2 week coverage at a time instead of trying to find 8-10 weeks of childcare every summer.

I assure you, you would find ways to complain about the nontraditional calendar. I taught in a school that had a nontraditional calendar in California and it was great. Great for a teacher. I loved all the breaks. But there were no camps or programming during the 2-3 weeks off. And you do realize that the non traditional calendar is also just 180 days? Except you don't get to benefit from ANY of the summer camps. Outdoor camps, sleepway camps. None of it.

The suggestion for year round school was made to counter the argument that "June is worthless." So the idea is that even if the school year was the same number of days, it would be more productive if kids had regular longer breaks but a shorter summer break, resulting in fewer "worthless" days of school. Also the biggest argument in favor of year round school has always been that it reduces learning loss over the summer and results in better educated kids because they are learning on a continuous basis and don't have this huge gap every year and then have to spend the first month or two of school just reviewing content from the previous year.

Also, we are talking about DCPS here and there are tons of camps in DC to cover shorter breaks during the year. Some offered by DCPS and some offered by private companies. Our school has a spring break camp every year for families who don't travel and need childcare -- there are always plenty of spots available. Also the school year is loaded with random days off for professional development, end of term, grading, etc. There are lots of day camps that crop of for these days so I'm sure the same would be true for longer breaks. As a parent, I'd much rather have to find a weeklong camp four times a year than have to figure out childcare for one long summer AND for a bunch of random days during the year. Year round school would enable us to consolidate all those breaks into four midsize breaks that families could split between travel/family time and camps for kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

Fun fact: There is this thing called google. You can google "dcps calendar" and then the calendar magically appears. So you can look at the calendar and see the two snow days built in making the last day June 23rd. It's pretty amazing. Look at the calendar. Count the number of days of school and you will see 180 days!!! The legal requirement!!!

But gosh, June 23rd is a Monday. Womp womp. Cue in the parents complaining about the vacation they already booked. Take out the Kleenex for the parents who had already signed up for summer camp. I hope central office and principals have cleared out their inboxes for all the sad and angwee emails they are about to get. Lonely tear.

But wait! Maybe we make up our snow days on the PD days! Oh, again, I hope principals and central office clear out their inboxes because families booked a three day trip for that made up day! It's the cheapest time of year to fly to Utah. So angwee. So sad. Boo hoo.

But not all parents feel that way. Why would DCPS just skip those days because a minority of parents will complain about it? I don't honestly even understand why they are complaining -- if you booked a vacation for the day after school ends, go take your vacation. Who cares. But shouldn't school be in session for the other kids? Why are we just getting rid of school calendar days because some parents have conflicts. It makes no sense at all.

[Anonymous]

Our school had a week off for Thanksgiving, and then less than a month later, two weeks of at Christmas. Why???

They had aftercare coverage for an asynchronous learning day, but then no effort to get the kids on computers to do the assigned work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OSSE has extremely lax rules about what counts as a school day. It allows schools to claim they are in session for 180 days when any normal person tallying up the days would not come anywhere close to 180 days. It's really scandalous.

Can't even count on DC schools to meet the legal minimum standard.

Fun fact: There is this thing called google. You can google "dcps calendar" and then the calendar magically appears. So you can look at the calendar and see the two snow days built in making the last day June 23rd. It's pretty amazing. Look at the calendar. Count the number of days of school and you will see 180 days!!! The legal requirement!!!

But gosh, June 23rd is a Monday. Womp womp. Cue in the parents complaining about the vacation they already booked. Take out the Kleenex for the parents who had already signed up for summer camp. I hope central office and principals have cleared out their inboxes for all the sad and angwee emails they are about to get. Lonely tear.

But wait! Maybe we make up our snow days on the PD days! Oh, again, I hope principals and central office clear out their inboxes because families booked a three day trip for that made up day! It's the cheapest time of year to fly to Utah. So angwee. So sad. Boo hoo.

Good job completely missing the point. Of course, every school claims to be meeting the 180 day requirement. No one says they are ignoring the law. But if you count up the actual days in session, many of these schools are nowhere close to 180.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:this is a really serious issue that no one pays attention to. our charter school doesnt come anywhere close to 180 days and no one cares. parents aren't paying attention and osse lets schools ignore the law.

They are just waiting until someone sues. I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet by a family with a special needs child.

I dont think parents realize their schools are doing it. They just assume the school is following the rules.

This but there is also a contingent of parents who don't care and actually are happy when there is less school.

This group is larger when there is a debate over something like adding days to the school year for snow days. I remember tons of parents last year lobbying against the snow days because they had vacation plans right after school got out or "whatever it's not like kids learn anything the last week" or just not wanting to deal with school commutes for a couple more days. It's remarkable how many people just don't value education at all and view school as little more than a babysitting service or an annoying obligation. Depressing.

Some might say that adding more days at the end of the school year is a babysitting service, too. You are clinging on to the extra days for what? Stop acting like this is unique to DCPS or modern education. Everyone knows the month of June is a joke. You think you were reading an anthology and having socratic seminars in the 3rd grade on June 15th in the 80's? Stop acting like it's some kind of inequity and just say you need babysitting.

Everyone does not know that. It's a defeatist attitude people adopt to justify not making any effort.

I personally think we should switch to year round school with seasonal breaks to avoid this BS.

Is it though? Do you know how many year long parents complain about burning through their PTO? No camps, no programming? And the really rich just get to go on two week vacations every 6-8 weeks.

The system isn't perfect. No system is. It is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. I am sure DCPS will add on the extra days and the parents who already have plans will rage and continue with their life plans. And you will get to send your child to school so they don't miss out on their socratic seminar.

If we switched to year round school there would be camps and programming during the seasonal breaks. Just like right now there are camps and programming in the summer. It would actually be easier to provide coverage. It's often hard to find camps in mid-August around here because a lot of them shut down by the 1st week of August. If we did shorter seasonal breaks instead of a long summer, it might actually be easier to have coverage because you'd only have to find 1-2 week coverage at a time instead of trying to find 8-10 weeks of childcare every summer.

I assure you, you would find ways to complain about the nontraditional calendar. I taught in a school that had a nontraditional calendar in California and it was great. Great for a teacher. I loved all the breaks. But there were no camps or programming during the 2-3 weeks off. And you do realize that the non traditional calendar is also just 180 days? Except you don't get to benefit from ANY of the summer camps. Outdoor camps, sleepway camps. None of it.

The suggestion for year round school was made to counter the argument that "June is worthless." So the idea is that even if the school year was the same number of days, it would be more productive if kids had regular longer breaks but a shorter summer break, resulting in fewer "worthless" days of school. Also the biggest argument in favor of year round school has always been that it reduces learning loss over the summer and results in better educated kids because they are learning on a continuous basis and don't have this huge gap every year and then have to spend the first month or two of school just reviewing content from the previous year.

Also, we are talking about DCPS here and there are tons of camps in DC to cover shorter breaks during the year. Some offered by DCPS and some offered by private companies. Our school has a spring break camp every year for families who don't travel and need childcare -- there are always plenty of spots available. Also the school year is loaded with random days off for professional development, end of term, grading, etc. There are lots of day camps that crop off for these days so I'm sure the same would be true for longer breaks. As a parent, I'd much rather have to find a weeklong camp four times a year than have to figure out childcare for one long summer AND for a bunch of random days during the year. Year round school would enable us to consolidate all those breaks into four midsize breaks that families could split between travel/family time and camps for kids.

The nearing of any ending or break is a waste of time. You could have it once a year or 12 times a year. It's human nature. In schools, the anticipation of a break means...assessments. Why teach new material after an assessment and a few days before a three week break? You think year round schools don't have celebrations? Anknowledge holidays? Go on field trips? All the things you deem as a "waste of time" and probably not worthy of what makes schooling whole? Unless you work in medicine or on Wall Street, time and work production slows down in anticipation of holidays.

Also, there is whole economy built on summer travel and summer camps. This isn't a stubborn teacher union thing.