Would you support 200 day school year?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I lived in Arizona where we had a modified year round calendar. It was wildly popular. There were four quarters a year with two weeks off in between session in the fall, winter and spring, plus a 6 week summer break. The breaks were great because older kids were between classes so had absolutely no work to do during break, so no studying, projects, etc. They were completely free. The calendar also didn't have the same wasted 3-4 weeks at the end of the year like we do in Virginia after SOLs, as teachers taught the same content for 4th quarter classes as they did when that class was offered in a different quarter. Kids also missed less school for family vacations because there were cheaper times to travel built into the school year. There was less of a loss of momentum over a short summer, but still time for kids to go to a few weeks of sleep away camp plus a family vacation. Sports didn't start until school started, so that didn't cut into the summer at all.

It was great, but a change like that would require the whole region to switch and I don't see that happening.

This sounds great. Sign me up. They only gave the kids here 8 weeks summer here in NOVA and we sure didn't get 2 weeks off other times of the year. Just a measily 3 days off for thanksgiving! So many wasted teacher work days. The.n they berate you if you ever need to take the kids out of school for a day or 2. No excused absences. Give me a break!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You ready to pay every single 10 month staff member and hourly staff for 20 extra days? Next question: What are you willing to cut from the budget?

Or do you just need more “free” childcare?

I don't need it, but I'll pay for it for those who do. If I had a time machine I would start by cutting the ridiculous aquatics center that cost $100 million and who knows what else to actually operate and then move on from there.

You can afford it all by yourself? Or are you trying to demand that others join you in paying?

I'm not sure what you mean by "demand" as this is a message board and I don't have authority over taxing and spending. But yeah I do think it would be a worthy use of tax dollars. I can tell from reading these boards that many people would benefit from more school.

So you're willing to pay for it with someone else's money. How noble.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You ready to pay every single 10 month staff member and hourly staff for 20 extra days? Next question: What are you willing to cut from the budget?

Or do you just need more “free” childcare?

I don't need it, but I'll pay for it for those who do. If I had a time machine I would start by cutting the ridiculous aquatics center that cost $100 million and who knows what else to actually operate and then move on from there.

You can afford it all by yourself? Or are you trying to demand that others join you in paying?

I'm not sure what you mean by "demand" as this is a message board and I don't have authority over taxing and spending. But yeah I do think it would be a worthy use of tax dollars. I can tell from reading these boards that many people would benefit from more school.

So you're willing to pay for it with someone else's money. How noble.

Why are you so hung up on this? Other school districts do this already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I lived in Arizona where we had a modified year round calendar. It was wildly popular. There were four quarters a year with two weeks off in between session in the fall, winter and spring, plus a 6 week summer break. The breaks were great because older kids were between classes so had absolutely no work to do during break, so no studying, projects, etc. They were completely free. The calendar also didn't have the same wasted 3-4 weeks at the end of the year like we do in Virginia after SOLs, as teachers taught the same content for 4th quarter classes as they did when that class was offered in a different quarter. Kids also missed less school for family vacations because there were cheaper times to travel built into the school year. There was less of a loss of momentum over a short summer, but still time for kids to go to a few weeks of sleep away camp plus a family vacation. Sports didn't start until school started, so that didn't cut into the summer at all.

It was great, but a change like that would require the whole region to switch and I don't see that happening.

Would love this!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I lived in Arizona where we had a modified year round calendar. It was wildly popular. There were four quarters a year with two weeks off in between session in the fall, winter and spring, plus a 6 week summer break. The breaks were great because older kids were between classes so had absolutely no work to do during break, so no studying, projects, etc. They were completely free. The calendar also didn't have the same wasted 3-4 weeks at the end of the year like we do in Virginia after SOLs, as teachers taught the same content for 4th quarter classes as they did when that class was offered in a different quarter. Kids also missed less school for family vacations because there were cheaper times to travel built into the school year. There was less of a loss of momentum over a short summer, but still time for kids to go to a few weeks of sleep away camp plus a family vacation. Sports didn't start until school started, so that didn't cut into the summer at all.

It was great, but a change like that would require the whole region to switch and I don't see that happening.

This sounds great. Sign me up. They only gave the kids here 8 weeks summer here in NOVA and we sure didn't get 2 weeks off other times of the year. Just a measily 3 days off for thanksgiving! So many wasted teacher work days. The.n they berate you if you ever need to take the kids out of school for a day or 2. No excused absences. Give me a break!

Um… teacher here…

Those teacher work days aren’t wasted. They mean I occasionally get to finish some work during the week for once, so I don’t have to spend all day Saturday and Sunday catching up. (I started planning for next week at 6am this Saturday morning, just to illustrate this.)

But back to the topic of this thread, I’m all for a 200 day school year. Bring it on, especially if it means I get breaks spread out throughout the year instead of being forced to take my only true break during the summer. Sounds great!

[Anonymous]

To answer the OP, no I wouldn't support that. Its already too much free daycare as it is. The required materials could be covered in a much shorter time period and we could get rid of all the fluff used to make the day longer for working parents.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't support a longer school year, but I would like to start earlier to give the kids more time to study for AP exams and SOLs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A billion percent (I am a teacher in a Title I school). We waste so much time getting kids back into routines and making up for massive learning loss over the summer. If this was offered in my district, I would transfer schools to teach on that schedule.

I see at our school, that kids watched a movie twice this week when it was raining or too hot for outdoor recess. I see that they don't do ANYTHING the last 2 weeks of school. I see that the days before each break are empty. I see that my kids are bored because they are not challenged and are not free to do more in school. I agree school should be year-round, but I also think teachers should be paid more and tech should play a much smaller part and we should stop teaching for the test and teach for life.

+1 on the bolded parts, so no, I don't think adding more school days is the answer, though I would like more breaks during the school year to travel so year round school sounds interesting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Richmond Public School District has increased the number of days of the school year to counter Covid learning loss. Would you support that if your district did it? https://www.cbsnews.com/news/virginia-school-district-expands-academic-year/

Nope. There's not enough family time as it is. We use breaks to travel (local, driving distance and flying), and occasional stay-cation, but it's all family time, whether nuclear family or extended family. In summer, the kids do some camps they are interested in, or do swim team in addition to family time.
We're not giving it up!

[Anonymous]

yes i sure would

[Anonymous]

Wish we would move to a year round school model.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Richmond Public School District has increased the number of days of the school year to counter Covid learning loss. Would you support that if your district did it? https://www.cbsnews.com/news/virginia-school-district-expands-academic-year/

Nope. There's not enough family time as it is. We use breaks to travel (local, driving distance and flying), and occasional stay-cation, but it's all family time, whether nuclear family or extended family. In summer, the kids do some camps they are interested in, or do swim team in addition to family time.
We're not giving it up!

This is also our family's situation. But I see a real benefit to having a longer school year and having the traditional summer months available for the many families who would benefit from this. I don't know how it could make work so it's optional, but I would love to see the core/standard stuff during the current school year and different programming during the summer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I lived in Arizona where we had a modified year round calendar. It was wildly popular. There were four quarters a year with two weeks off in between session in the fall, winter and spring, plus a 6 week summer break. The breaks were great because older kids were between classes so had absolutely no work to do during break, so no studying, projects, etc. They were completely free. The calendar also didn't have the same wasted 3-4 weeks at the end of the year like we do in Virginia after SOLs, as teachers taught the same content for 4th quarter classes as they did when that class was offered in a different quarter. Kids also missed less school for family vacations because there were cheaper times to travel built into the school year. There was less of a loss of momentum over a short summer, but still time for kids to go to a few weeks of sleep away camp plus a family vacation. Sports didn't start until school started, so that didn't cut into the summer at all.

It was great, but a change like that would require the whole region to switch and I don't see that happening.

Would love this!

+1. This sounds far better than our current schedule.

[Anonymous]

YES, KIDS ARE STILLP PISSED OFF WE STOLE 2 SCHOOL YEARS FROM THE. THEY STILL THINK THEY ARE THE SAME AGE THEY WERE IN 2020

[Anonymous]

School all year would be great. Especially if they had camps or something for the youngers whenever the "breaks" took place. The amount my kiddos loose during the summer is drastic. It takes months to get back in the swing of things - plus they love school!