When Americans think of year-round education they immediately relate it to no summer vacations, hence the reason why, at first glance, most students and parents are contrary to that which comes off as a negative idea. Little do we know, as Americans, that year-round schooling has many more advantages than disadvantages. Back when schools had just began, summers were necessary because children needed to help their families by working on their families farms. Nowadays, as we all know, this is not the case. Year-round schooling consists of the same amount of school days, 180, just spread out over 12 months rather than 10. Although students do not get a “summer” they do, in fact, get numerous 2-3 week breaks throughout the school year (Tumgoren, 2009, L02). During these breaks, optional classes and workshops are offered to students whom are seeking extra help in classes, parents who can’t afford daycare, or for kids who are just plain bored. These workshops offered during students’ weeks off are called intersessions. Imagine how much knowledge our students will gain if federal Department of Education funding goes towards these intersessions! Retaining and expanding the knowledge of our students is the objective of these intersession classes. If this project is funded by the government there will be a plethora of positive and successful outcomes in result of these optional intersession classes.
Certainly, neither students nor teachers enjoy the idea of the school year without a summer, but, in terms of year-round schooling, this is not necessarily the case. Although there is no official “summer” break, there are multiple 15-30 day breaks throughout the year (Schulte, 2009, B1). The importance of this is the students’ retention of the...
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...filmed them, later learning how to edit and revise them on the computer. Schulte tells readers that year-round schooling was worrisome to both her and her children at first, but after realizing how beneficial it ended up being in the end, they realized how much they truly loved it. Intersessions not only offer remedial sessions for children needing extra help, but also classes teaching things such as karate, ballett, photography, cooking, swimming, calligraphy, Japanese, and art(INTEXTXITE).
According to President Obama and the Education Secretary Arne Duncan, the traditional school day and school year are “outdated” and “inadequate for the demands of 21st-century life”(INTEXTCITE). The reason why students in other counties outscore many American students is because they typically attend, on average, 50 more days of school per year than the average American student.
One of the most talked about issues of schooling today, would be year round schooling. The program started as a new way to learn. The old way and still the way most schools calendar is set up was designed the way it is due to harvest times, when the United States was a farming country. There have been many studies done, and some schools have already implemented this program. The studies and the schools that have gone ahead and implemented the program have seen both good things and bad things in their findings. There will be both pros and cons for every issue, and some may see pros and cons differently. Year round schooling is the idea of attending school for an entire year, not all 365 days, but continuously throughout the year. Year round schooling operates on a different schedule to incorporate the same amount of classroom time as a typical school schedule has. The only difference is that the breaks are shorter, but there are more of them in year round schooling. This is the basis of most of the arguments for and against year round schooling.
A student at Ste. Genevieve High School even expressed how she needs the summer break to unwind and not have to care about studying for a class when school would return to session. Another reason students may oppose this change is due to the fact High School students may hold summer jobs to earn some spending money. In certain instances, the year-round calendar may prevent students from holding these jobs or holding them for extended periods of time. One more reason students may disapprove of year-round education is because of extracurricular activities, and how they will be changed or shifted. New teachers can be affected in many ways. Unlike teachers who work in traditional school districts, they do not have the long summer to prepare and acquaint themselves for the forthcoming school year. Along with preparing lessons and assignments, teachers would not be able to take their own vacations and prepare for school
Paul von Hippel, an author of study and research statistician in Sociology at The Ohio State University, says, “We found that students in year-round schools learn more during the summer, when others are on vacation, but they seem to learn less than other children during the rest of the year” (Grabmeier). Both schedules, year and traditional, have 180 days in their school year, the difference in scheduling is that the year-round schools have many short breaks throughout the school year, while the traditional gets a long summer break and a few breaks during the
The change of the system to include summer breaks was due to issues not quite under their
The United States has a long and proud history of providing public education to its citizen’s children. The fundamental idea behind the creation of this educational system was that it be available to all, regardless of geographical location or family status. In the era that this initiative was generated many of America’s families lived and worked on farms, and children were a vital part of this lifestyle. The founders of the United States’ public schools had to create a plan that included all children, even those who were expected to perform agricultural work in the harvest season. Thus, the nine-month school calendar was brought into use, allowing farming children a three month break from school in the summer to aid their families in the crop yield. In time, youth participation in farming became outdated and obsolete, and this arrangement slipped from necessity to simply being a tradition held on to through the years. In our modern era, a year-round school calendar would benefit the teachers, students, and finances of America’s public schools.
The BC Ministry of Education recently allowed for flexibility in how school districts choose to organize their school calendars. BC School Districts currently follow a traditional school year calendar with students attending school approximately 190 days, most with a two week break in winter and spring and two months off during the summer months. “This model was very practical when the school calendar was designed to accommodate children with the needs of an agricultural economy” (qtd in Webb 5), and can be “described by some as outdated and irrelevant in today’s society” (Winter 401). A balanced school year calendar, also referred to as a modified school year and year round school, would maintain the same number of instructional days, but would evenly distribute breaks throughout the year. The literature and research available on the balanced school year is mostly American, with a few Canadian sources. This research indicates that those in support of this type of calendar see many benefits, but the most strongly supported with evidence is the reduction of summer learning loss experienced by students, especially for English as a second language (ESL) and low income students. For those who oppose the balanced school year, some believe summer learning loss does not exist and some strongly argue that changing the school calendar is only warranted with proof of increased academic achievement for students.
Full year schools are numbered at three thousand eighty-one nationwide (in 2002-2003), compared to the roughly ninety-five thousand schools that are not year-round. This shows how little faith and trust is had towards this new, yet stale, initiative of inadequacy already, as schools continue to switch back from year round to traditional. One of the three most common ways in which students experience this deficiency is the forty-five-fifteen plan, in which seven weeks (forty in-school days) of school occurs, followed by three weeks (fifteen days) of vacation. The second is the sixty-twenty plan; twelve weeks of school followed by four weeks of vacation. The third organization of days is the ninety-thirty plan, effectively splitting summer in twain. Some elaboration, however, is required: each of these schemes has only one hundred eighty days, equivalent to the number days in a normal school year.
There are various models of YRS that can be implemented, all of which are reconfigurations of the traditional, nine-month calendar. In some areas these models are known as alternative or modified calendars (Shields & Oberg, 2000) and they all have unique characteristics. Because of theses differences, school systems should spend some time analyzing which model will be best for their particular school; educators may find that some models work better than others depending on the school. Estimates on the exact number of year round schedules vary, although it has been estimated that at least 50 different scheduling patterns exist (Palmer & Bemis, 1999). The most common alternatives include the single track calendar and the multi-track calendar.
Year round schooling is becoming increasingly popular in the United States, and has shown positive academic benefits for students enrolled in year round schools. Many countries implement year round schooling, and academic ability of their students greatly surpasses those of the United States. Year round schooling, as well as increase in school days should be implemented in schools nationwide in the United States. The need for long summer vacations is non-existent, as society has become industrialized. Implementing year-round schooling, and increasing the number of school days will allow the United States to invest more time into education in order to grow and build academic success.
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)
Throughout time education has been considered a process that every so often must be improved. The education quality in the U.S. has declined over the years and people have been looking for a way to make improvements. A more recent proposal has been to go from a traditional nine-month schedule to an all year program. Supporters of year round school claim it gives the student a better education. However, the prospect of year round school is not beneficial to the taxpayers pocket, to the education a student receives, or to the people involved with the district.
One benefit of the year round schooling is that there can be an overlap of s...
Students who are enrolled in a year-round school attend school for 180 days, the same number of days as students on a traditional calendar schedule. A year-round school calendar is formulated into nine-week quarters. Each quarter is separated by a three-week break called an intersession. There is still a summer vacation , but at four or five weeks, it is less than half that of a traditional school summer break, and does not provide enough time for students to completely forget what they learned all year. This solution actually reduces the problem. This school system has been proven to have positive effects on student achievement, especially for students with learning disabilities. The goal of year-round schooling is to create continuous or extended learning by adding hours to the days and days to the year. According to the benefits of year round education article, “Fifty years ago, most American households were supported by a working father, while mothers were expected to stay at home. However, the women’s movement of the 1970’s combined with the rise in divorce rate and the high cost of living, lead to a decline of stay at home mothers.”First, The shorter vacations implemented by year-round education and intersession are helpful to today’s working parents because it is a less expensive alternative to daycare or summer camps. Also, parents and teachers can schedule vacations
Family vacations, pool memberships, and corn de-tasseling; these have been the experiences of traditional Midwestern summers. For centuries young American children have attended school during the winter months, during farming off seasons when their families could afford to be without them. Families have grown accustomed to a traditional school calendar that provides time for bonding throughout the year. Students have grown accustomed to an eight week break during the summer months where they are allowed to refresh their minds before returning for a new school year. Unfortunately, these traditional experiences and practices are now in jeopardy. In today’s race to improve student achievement, traditional school calendars have become a point of contention. Today more and more school districts and parents alike have begun to debate the pros and cons of an alternative school calendar.
...on what they have learned by attending more days in school but not getting burned out on a traditional nine month school schedule. A few short breaks allows the mind to rest but not forget everything they have worked hard to achieve educational greatness. American society will achieve great things if the education system takes a step in all schools operating on a year round calendar.