Question in an American Teacher publication: Should school start before Labor Day?
Pro: The rhythm and demands of the modern school year, particularly in the upper grades, are best addressed when public schools start before Labor Day. Students in schools that follow traditional school calendars are at a disadvantage when it comes to such national tests as AP, SAT, ACT. These students end up with fewer days to prepare in class than their peers in states where the school year starts earlier. Starting a week earlier also means ending a week earlier the following spring--an earlier summer vacation that will allow all parties to rest and come back before Labor Day ready to start again.
Con: Waiting until after Labor Day could be educationally sound and financially beneficial in this troubled economy. A large number of parents tend to plan late summer vacations, which causes attendance to be a real problem at the beginning of school. Parents feel that the weeks at the end of August are one of the last opportunities to vacation and spend quality time together with their children. States and many communities also would benefit financially from the later start date. Switching to August start dates can cut up to three weeks from the August tourism season. Another financial factor to consider is the overall cost of cooling classrooms in August.
What do you think?
10 comments:
How refreshing to move beyond the union vote and to have the opportunity to discuss something of educational importance. Starting school earlier is something that is catching on more and more across the country for a number of reasons. Some districts are even looking at doing away with the one week vacation in either February or April. Besides the obvious-- starting earlier means finishing earlier--early start dates also allow schools to complete the first semester before winter break, which keeps information fresh in students' minds and boosts achievement, even among those students who tend to be the most disruptive in the classroom. An earlier start also will allow for the completion of semester exams before the winter break; and it aligns more closely with the schedule of colleges, allowing early high school graduates and dual-enrollment students to easily take higher education courses. In the modern school setting, early starts just make sense. I hope it is something that will be considered for negotiation when the time comes to negotiate a new contract.
Even more important-morning START times....all the research shows that high school students should start their day LATER than elementary.
The research has been there for years! And we might even save some money. We need to do this. Sit in the main office at the high school and count the tardy students. This needs to be addressed. Anything that has the potential to increase attendance and graduation rate should be executed ASAP.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-20009767-10391704.html
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/aug/23/health/la-he-school-time-20100823
If it's change everyone is screaming for, How about something that actually sounds like it would be a positive change? Not to mention, it has the research to back it up! Yes, it would need to be negotiated but how many of us would love to wake up a little later, not be disrupted 7 times during A block by students walking in tardy, or teach one more student that would otherwise be napping on their desk. I'm all for earlier start of the year and later start of the day! Sounds good for everyone.
The students should start BEFORE Labor Day. It could work like this:
Monday: Orientation Day (Grades 6 and 9)
Tuesday-Thursday: ALL Grades Report
Friday-Monday (Labor Day): Weekend
This scenario would give us three additional days of quality learning before MCAS.
I agree. Research speaks to starting high schools later because HS aged youths are more awake and more aware later in the day. I think, however, that because both of these concepts are "out of the box" concepts they will not be received with enthusiasm. If I were a betting person I would tend to bet that professionals in our field would be more receptive to starting school earlier in the year and finishing earlier than to beginning the day later and getting off work later. Another educational concept to think about: We are finally starting to realize that just about every country we compare our NAEP and TIMMS scores to, and which do much better than us on these respective tests, has a longer school day and longer school year. I wouldn't be surprised to see some of these concepts thrown at us come negotiation time.
One of the arguments used in the past against starting school before Labor Day has been that teachers and parents make vacation plans sometimes a year in advance. This same argument has been used when the proposal to eliminate one of the one week vacations has come up. Arguments that starting early would add costs because the buildings would have to be cooled don't hold weight because the buildings are not cooled anyway. Try teaching summer school. Starting school later in the day will simply mean that students who are late will come in later in the day. And these will be the same students who were late when we started earlier in the day. Missed the bus, didn't have a ride, woke up late, had to take my brother to school, I work after school. Do you really believe these excuses will disappear because school starts later in the day. I once read that one of the biggest arguments against starting school before Labor Day was the negative impact it would have on back to school sales. How do you win in this profession?? I will say, however, that like The Insider, I prefer this kind of dialogue to arguing over the previous issue.
Speaking of trends, the September issue of American School Board Journal reports that the number of school districts considering a four day school week has risen from 2% in 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 to 13% in 2010-2011.
Incidently, there seems to be a lot of national concern about the teacher evaluation requirement in the RTTT grant money. Some feel that our reliance on test data as an end instead of an indicator has already warped and corrupted schooling. We teach to the math and reading tests already, giving short shift to everything else. We emphasize test prep over learning which has undermined the intent of NCLB. Now we want to raise the stakes further by basing teacher pay and job security on test scores too? All while having one of the shortest school days and shortest school years in the world.
How do we realistically improve attendance and tardy rates? There are a lot of great strategies that have proved themselves integral in increasing attendance for some schools but the last poster does make a very important point. We can lay down the law all we want; when students and parents simply don't care enough about education, it doesn't matter what we do. If I am going to be held accountable based on my students' test scores then I want the parent that lets their kid stay home from school 75 days out of the year held accountable. How is it my fault that I had a student last year that was tardy 127 days???!!!! I am not joking. Why should behavior like that even be tolerated? Would you still have a job if you were late to work 127 times in a year? It doesn't matter what we do or how we teach. If a student chooses not to succeed they will not regardless of what we do. We have been pandering to them and the state now for years. They tell us what to do and we do it. When their brilliant plan doesn't work, we get the blame. I say we should be the ones to make the decisions and policy and we enforce it to the fullest extent. If people don't adhere to the policy, then they suffer the consequences, just like we and the rest of the world do. It seems like we have gotten to the point where we are practically begging kids to graduate and doing everything just short of handing them the damn diploma. What message does this send? I wouldn't mind a later day or starting earlier in the year; it does make sense, but I do agree that it is probably not the answer. The kids will still continue to do what they want as long as they can get away with it. Our answer lies in enforcement and consequences. I read a study about districts that require PARENTS to take a class on school attendance when their child exceeds the attendance minimum. The results were very positive and improved attendance and tardiness significantly. Inconvenience them, and they will come.......Make it too easy and they just don't bother.
I'm glad this issue came up and is being discussed. As I look around I see plenty of other school districts in session already. What do they know that we don't? What sense does it make for me to have to return from vacation to attend two days and then have the rest of the week off, in addition to Labor Day??? What sense does it make to have three PD days spread out over several months???? Here's a couple of suggestions from a peon which I hope will be given some serious consideration come negotiation time:
1) Why not start school and have kids attend before Labor Day and at some point have three consecutive days of meaningful professional development. This would be a nice break for the kids and would allow for some continuing and relevant professional development.
2) Barring the above, why not use the entire week before Labor Day for teacher orientation, professional development and freshman orientation? I had to return from vacation anyway. Why not use the whole week, have a long weekend, and then get going. Could this possibly knock off three days on the other end and allow us to finish earlier? I think we need to start thinking outside the box. We need to take a look at what is going on around us in other districts and instead of saying "why", say "why not"?
This is being written on Friday, September 3, 2010. I find it interesting that as I'm reading my various newspapers on line this morning I'm reading about the schools which started early this week already planning to dismiss early or cancelling school because of the threat of the storm. In the comment section several people questioned why have school at all today if the kids are going to be released early. Those which cancel school already have to make up a day. Those which dismiss early already have one less day of school because today will count as a school day. The kids of those parents who opt not to send them to school today and those kids who don't go to school on Fridays already have one absence. I guess the same problems exist regardless of when we start school. We might as well start early so we can get them started early so they can end early.
Post a Comment