Schools throughout the United States are making the switch to year-round education (Zubruzycki). Year-round schools “swap out” the long summer break for “shorter breaks throughout the year” (Zubruzycki). Converting to a year-round program will benefit students, educators and communities. The traditional 180-day school year in Minnesota should convert to a year-round education calendar.
The year-round school calendar has many different schedules in which a school may choose to use. One calendar schedule is the 60/20. According to the article “Year-Round Schooling Really Works” written by Jerry R. Barber, the 60/20 schedule is when “students attend school for 60 days and then have 20 days off.” This is one of the most common year-round schedules
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With year-round education programs, teachers are able to increase their salary if they wish. The California Department of Education states teachers whose calendar runs on a multitrack pattern “are able to earn more money if they choose to teach extra sessions or substitute.” Teachers whose school district has offered the intersession program can teach mini-courses, take students on field trips, and also help students who have fallen behind in their academics (Barber 31). Year-round programs provide many benefits to teachers as well as students who need the multiple breaks throughout the …show more content…
Some families actually prefer to staggered vacation breaks throughout the year (CA Dept. of Education). Stated in the article, “Forgoing Summer Vacation, Parents Swamp Year-Round Schooling” written by Ron French, was the perspective of a parent who believes “summer causes bigger problems than just boredom” (28). Many families located in Michigan made the decision to enroll their child into a year-round education calendar” (French 28). A family who owns a farm in Michigan stated “we can’t get away as much in the summer. Having more time in the winter with the boys is a plus” (French 29). Families are able to plan vacations at any time throughout the school year (Fraser 9). Also appointments can be made on days where the students are on break which allows the student to not miss any instructional time. Having the school left open, many “children, parents, community members” and “college students” take advantage of the library being open (Barber 31). Not only then do people have access to the internet but schools who leave their kitchen open provide meals for people who may not be able to afford to pay for meals on their own (Barber 31). The Socorro Independent School District is one school that allows community members to use the schools’ material. They stated that “keeping our school open and functioning during the summer provides a haven for
Attending a year round school will help students retain the information they are taught with greater ease due to the shortness in breaks between times they attend school. An Indianapolis fourth-grade school teacher says, “In this calendar, my goodness, (it takes) two weeks at most.”, referring to the six weeks it normally takes to review the previous year’s lesson to get the students up to speed from the summer break (Johnson). If you are to add twenty days to t...
The phrase “year-round” scares students and parents alike. Some argue that students attending school year-round will get so burnt out that the new schedule would be counterproductive. However, the term “year-round” is misleading. Students would not go to school non-stop twelve months out of the year. Instead, students would attend in blocks separated by short but frequent breaks (Hapka). The National Education Association gives insight to the block system:
While growing up, I attended a traditional school. This is a schooling method many individuals are probably familiar with. A student attends school for nine months out of the year, and then has a three month break during the summer. However, in my immediate hometown surroundings, nearby traditional schools are assessing the idea of transforming into year-round schools. Year round schooling is one subject debated in high schools, middle schools, and elementary schools nationwide. Are schools that operate 365 days a year academically better than traditional schools? What are the cost differences between the two? How would a year-round school effect families? Changing the schooling technique from traditional to year-round has numerous variables that need to be taken into consideration before any grade school or secondary education institution fully commits. Year-round schooling schedules should not be implemented and traditional schooling calendars should be maintained.
18 Nov. 2011. Cooper, Harris. Interview. The. “More Than a Hunch: Kids Lose Learning Skills Over the Summer” months.”
Back in the olden days, schools were originally put on a schedule in which students would spend the majority of the year in school, and 2-3 months off for summer break. The purpose of this was so that children could be home for the summer to help their parents run family farms. Today, due to progressive industrialization of farming, modernized farming equipment, and decrease in family farms, the need for children to be home during the summer to help run family farms is minute if not obsolete; because of this many schools across the United States have transitioned to year-round schooling (“Summer”). Contrary to belief, year round schooling does not usually mean more school days. Currently most year-round schools adhere to the 180 day school year. Instead of the traditional lengthy summer vacation, year-round schools distribute the 180 days throughout the entire year while allowing for shorter breaks. Common scheduling for year-round schools includes cycles of 2-3 months in school followed by 2-3 week breaks (“Research Spotlight...
According to the National Association for Year-Round Education, more than 2 million students attend close to 3,000 year-round schools in 41 states and 610 school districts, which is a dramatic increase compared to the early 1990’s. There are a variety of YRE schedules and currently there is the choice of single or multi-track, options within both of those, and an extended school year. Single track YRE -.. Single-track YRE is simply the reorganization of vacation time; summer break is broken up and distributed to make a more continuous period of instruction. All students and teachers follow the same schedule, and the rescheduled vacation is integrated throughout the school year into periods called intersessions. Intersessions are “usually utilized as instructional time for remediation and enrichment” with both single and multi-track calendars.
Year round school or the modified school year is a rearrangement of the traditional school year to provide the students with continuous learning throughout the school year. Students receive the same amount of instructional time as a traditional school. In year round schools, the instructional time is balanced without of school time more evenly. (Winter, 2005) The National Association for Year Round Schooling defines it as “a schedule which contains no break lasting longer than eight weeks-schools are able to keep their students in constant learning mode, and are able to use the intersessions between periods of schooling to address the problems of students who are falling behind.” (St. Gerard, 2007, pg. 57) There are three common tracks of year round schooling. They are the single track, multitrack, and extended year. The single track is scheduled throughput the year into intersessions which allow time for enrichment or red-mediation. The multitrack is used to help schools reduce overcrowding. The school divides the teachers and students into groups of an equal size. Each group has its own schedule. One group is on intercession while the other is in school. The extended year increases the amount of time spent in schools from 180 days to as many as 240 days a year. (McGlynn, 2002)
All year school ends up costing the school district and surrounding community more money than a traditional nine-month schedule. "More funds would be needed to cover the costs of paying the teachers and staff for one full year instead of for 180 days work." (Stevenson 2). "Teachers currently make an average of $37, 000 in the United States. However, the costs would increase to $53, 000 to keep the teachers for a full year." (Somersby 8). Currently, a district uses a lot of its budget on paying teachers. Once the increased costs are put in place, the budget depletes rapidly. Yet teachers must be paid, as they are the cornerstones of education. Also, it takes additional funds to run the school all year, due to things such as air conditioning in the summer (White 28). Many schools due not currently need AC systems to be used. However, AC is a costly ame...
Year-round school, also known as a “balanced calendar”, is a new idea that is being brought up all over the United States. When most people hear the term “year-round school” they often think that school will literally be all year. In reality, year-round school is still the 180 days that a nine-month school year would be. The 180 days are stretched out through all 12 months of the year, and student get frequent breaks throughout the year. Schools that decide to use a balanced calendar have the option of how many days are spent in school and how many days will be spend on break. The most common schedule used is 45 days in school 15 days on break. There are also two types on year-round schooling systems. Single-track is when all the students are placed in the same schedule. They all attend school on the same days, and they all get the same days off. Multi-tracking is when the students are placed sub-sets. In an article that discusses the overview of year-round school they explain multi-tracking, “…the student body is divided into three of four subsets. The four sub-sets rotate vacation time, so that three sets of students attend school during a given term”(Chittom).
One benefit of the year round schooling is that there can be an overlap of s...
Shortly, we became more industrialized and had more advanced technology which made the summer vacation that was so crucial to the survival of the family now purposeless. With these long summer breaks, it can affect a child’s learning in so many ways. According to the benefits of year-round education article,”As of the 2006-2007 school year, nearly 2,800 U.S. schools were classified as year round.” One essential problem with long summer breaks is lack of retention of learned material and can lead to the student not being able to make progress with their learning in the next school year. In year-round schools, kids don’t waste time on review as opposed to traditional schools who take about three weeks reviewing the information they learned in the
Back in the early ages, the idea of year-round school would be thought as completely insane, because the farming families depended on their children to be home during harvest time. Now in modern times, the term year-round school is becoming more and more common in the United States of America. Slowly the schools are changing the way they teach, from giving the students a long three month break to a shorter one month break during the summer. The change of America’s high schools to the year-round schedule benefits both the schools and the students because they still get breaks throughout the school year, the children are less likely to forget information, the children would have more time with the teachers to learn, and the parents would not have to pay for childcare during the long summer break.
Year round school is a bad idea not just for students, but also for parents and teachers. There than 3,181 year round schools in the U.S. alone and only 10% of kids attend them. Basically, year round school will not provide academic success. Some teachers and principals believe it will not have a positive effect on kids. According to the teachers “Most kids need a summer off from school.” Year round school schedule is usually 6 to 9 weeks long with 2 to 3 break weeks.
Would you consider going to a school where you learn year-round? Maybe this would be your ideal school, but, when would you get to have some time to go to summer camp, or get a summer job, or play a sport with games during the day? Schools with the traditional schedule may actually be a better choice, and not just because kids love summer break. Schools should have a traditional school year schedule instead of a year round schedule because there isn’t a significant difference between the students’ performance, and year round schedules make planning family vacations hard, make the teachers’ job more difficult, and are more expensive. Also, having a summer break allows kids to participate in activities that they would not be able to do on a year round schedule due to the shorter breaks.
What do you think about going to school year round with little breaks here and there, but not your traditional three month summer break? Year round schooling has been a decision argued with the government, teachers, principals and parents. Many kids and adults like to relax on their three month break. Many students are used to having two week winter break, one week spring break, and three months of summer break. Overall, one three month break would benefit than having three-week breaks broken up throughout the school year.