Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that teachers need more time, but why does that mean a school holiday for kids. If you are salary that often means you will work extended hours on occasion as required. If I am in meetings for 8 hours (happens often) and I have to meet a deadline, that means I am working late that day. An occasional TWD quarterly is fine but we shouldn't get jerking around with lesson plans requiring a day off.

If teachers need training, that should happen during the summer.

“Extended hours on occasion” is everyday from Aug to June for teachers

This. I find parents so far removed on how many extra hours teachers work daily/weekly. Now if the county took things off teacher’s plates, that would help immensely. But we do more than just plan, teach and grade.

Then use the union to get those things off a teachers plate.

Virginia is a right-to-work state. Unions have virtually zero power in our DC (Dear Commonwealth)

Thank God. Look at the crap they tried to pull during Covid.

Yes, how dare they think of their own safety and the safety of their families. Do you realize how big of an entitled a--hole you sound like?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that teachers need more time, but why does that mean a school holiday for kids. If you are salary that often means you will work extended hours on occasion as required. If I am in meetings for 8 hours (happens often) and I have to meet a deadline, that means I am working late that day. An occasional TWD quarterly is fine but we shouldn't get jerking around with lesson plans requiring a day off.

If teachers need training, that should happen during the summer.

“Extended hours on occasion” is everyday from Aug to June for teachers

This. I find parents so far removed on how many extra hours teachers work daily/weekly. Now if the county took things off teacher’s plates, that would help immensely. But we do more than just plan, teach and grade.

Then use the union to get those things off a teachers plate.

Virginia is a right-to-work state. Unions have virtually zero power in our DC (Dear Commonwealth)

Thank God. Look at the crap they tried to pull during Covid.

Thank go because it allowed me to quit teaching 2 weeks ago.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church City has it right:

https://patch.com/virginia/fallschurch/falls-church-school-year-start-earlier-under-new-calendar-policy

Sounds shockingly sane. Why can’t we just copy this?

Start two weeks prior to Labor Day and end NLT June 18. That's what FCPS has now. I like FCCPS' plan to approve the next school year's calendar in December.

Their goal is to end by 6/10. They will only recognize Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Diwali, and Eid Al Fitr as days that can't have tests and special activities (different from FCPS inlcuding two days of the dead, Bodhi day, Three Kings, Orthodox Christmas and Epiphany, Lunar New Year, start of Ramadan, Theravada; and different from FCPS that gives those 5 off and gives off Orthodox Good Friday). They will do the federal holidays off -- mentioning because of the discussion here about doing the federal holidays or the religious ones but not both.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that teachers need more time, but why does that mean a school holiday for kids. If you are salary that often means you will work extended hours on occasion as required. If I am in meetings for 8 hours (happens often) and I have to meet a deadline, that means I am working late that day. An occasional TWD quarterly is fine but we shouldn't get jerking around with lesson plans requiring a day off.

If teachers need training, that should happen during the summer.

“Extended hours on occasion” is everyday from Aug to June for teachers

This. I find parents so far removed on how many extra hours teachers work daily/weekly. Now if the county took things off teacher’s plates, that would help immensely. But we do more than just plan, teach and grade.

Then use the union to get those things off a teachers plate.

Virginia is a right-to-work state. Unions have virtually zero power in our DC (Dear Commonwealth)

Thank God. Look at the crap they tried to pull during Covid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that teachers need more time, but why does that mean a school holiday for kids. If you are salary that often means you will work extended hours on occasion as required. If I am in meetings for 8 hours (happens often) and I have to meet a deadline, that means I am working late that day. An occasional TWD quarterly is fine but we shouldn't get jerking around with lesson plans requiring a day off.

If teachers need training, that should happen during the summer.

“Extended hours on occasion” is everyday from Aug to June for teachers

This. I find parents so far removed on how many extra hours teachers work daily/weekly. Now if the county took things off teacher’s plates, that would help immensely. But we do more than just plan, teach and grade.

Then use the union to get those things off a teachers plate.

Virginia is a right-to-work state. Unions have virtually zero power in our DC (Dear Commonwealth)

Teacher work days should happen at the end of each quarter and the week or two before school starts (which would ideally happen after Labor Day in my world!) if you do that, you’d probably have quarter end and some federal holidays align better? I haven’t stared at the calendar to figure it out though. The current calendar seems way out of wack.

Prince William calendar is out.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I can say is it sounds like the random days off are here to stay.

Good. HS kids need them.

No, they don’t! Motivate your lazy HSchooler. Kids need consistent school.

My "lazy HSer" is a 2 Varsity sport athlete, National Honor Society, straight A student with 4 APs this year, having already taken 5 AP in previous years combined. She also has a 1520 SAT on her first attempt. She's far from lazy but she needs breaks. I know what my child needs. As does she.

Yes let’s have a whole school system’s calendar structured around what your daughter needs. GMAFB. I was a high achiever athlete and my mom let me take occasional days off when I needed them. I rested when I needed to and made up the work later. Your precious snowflake can do the same. If taking a day off would lead to more stress then you don’t do it. This isn’t rocket science.

Not OP but I have a high achieving middle schooler taking HS classes and I think the breaks are good. I can use your words back at you - Yes let’s have a whole school system’s calendar structured around what your kid needs.

For every parent crying about too many days off there is another parent who welcomes it. So deal with it!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I can say is it sounds like the random days off are here to stay.

Good. HS kids need them.

No, they don’t! Motivate your lazy HSchooler. Kids need consistent school.

My "lazy HSer" is a 2 Varsity sport athlete, National Honor Society, straight A student with 4 APs this year, having already taken 5 AP in previous years combined. She also has a 1520 SAT on her first attempt. She's far from lazy but she needs breaks. I know what my child needs. As does she.

Yes let’s have a whole school system’s calendar structured around what your daughter needs. GMAFB. I was a high achiever athlete and my mom let me take occasional days off when I needed them. I rested when I needed to and made up the work later. Your precious snowflake can do the same. If taking a day off would lead to more stress then you don’t do it. This isn’t rocket science.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church City has it right:

https://patch.com/virginia/fallschurch/falls-church-school-year-start-earlier-under-new-calendar-policy

Sounds shockingly sane. Why can’t we just copy this?

Start two weeks prior to Labor Day and end NLT June 18. That's what FCPS has now. I like FCCPS' plan to approve the next school year's calendar in December.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church City has it right:

https://patch.com/virginia/fallschurch/falls-church-school-year-start-earlier-under-new-calendar-policy

Sounds shockingly sane. Why can’t we just copy this?

Remember when everyone complained about O days. Well…

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All I can say is it sounds like the random days off are here to stay.

Good. HS kids need them.

No, they don’t! Motivate your lazy HSchooler. Kids need consistent school.

My "lazy HSer" is a 2 Varsity sport athlete, National Honor Society, straight A student with 4 APs this year, having already taken 5 AP in previous years combined. She also has a 1520 SAT on her first attempt. She's far from lazy but she needs breaks. I know what my child needs. As does she.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get that teachers need more time, but why does that mean a school holiday for kids. If you are salary that often means you will work extended hours on occasion as required. If I am in meetings for 8 hours (happens often) and I have to meet a deadline, that means I am working late that day. An occasional TWD quarterly is fine but we shouldn't get jerking around with lesson plans requiring a day off.

If teachers need training, that should happen during the summer.

I would love for FCPS to pay us for summer training. The 8 hours for training we got in August was easily 12 hours in reality. Then they added another 6 hours after that - no day was given for that - all completed in our “off time”.

Yes you should absolutely get paid to do the training.

But at the same time, lots of occupations do training on their own time. I am trying to understand the complaint here.

And many don't. I have a few days worth of mandatory trainings every year for my job, but there's no expectation I do it in my free time... it's mixed in throughout the year and occurs during working hours.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Abolish the random days off
Shorten winter break dramatically
Don’t make school after the SOLs count because we all know nothing happens then but glorified babysitting.
Get to teaching!!! We have a lot of ground to catch up on. Stop whining about how your kids need breaks.

So you prefer a 11-12 week summer vacation? Keep in mind that many people do not. Actually, quite a few of us would prefer to move toward year-round -- 9 weeks on, 3 weeks off for each quarter and a 5 week summer.

People want a longer summer break/getting out earlier in June because they really don’t learn a lot or do a lot after Memorial Day anyway so all that time just feels wasted.

This is a big part of it for sure. And why my child is "sick" a lot in that period of time. DC can be home doing other things or sitting around in school. The "last day of school" counting toward those hours they have to be in school, is 2 hours of kids sitting around in he Aux Gym. Even the teachers were encouraging the kids to stay home. It's a joke.

Total joke. That’s why people want longer summers because anything scheduled after exams is no school at all but yet they count it towards the legal requirement. People need to wake up and vote the SB out.

So are you advocating for 165 days of school or for an early August start date? Personally, I would not mind starting on 31 July or 7 August and getting out just before or after Memorial Day weekend.

I’m advocating for no breaks other than federal holidays, winter break, thanksgiving and spring break.

You get 180 days of school. When do you want the school year to start and end? It sounds like you prefer a really long summer?

Anonymous wrote:Falls Church City has it right:

https://patch.com/virginia/fallschurch/falls-church-school-year-start-earlier-under-new-calendar-policy

Sounds shockingly sane. Why can’t we just copy this?