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Monday, July 23, 2007
The Great Year-Round Schooling Debate
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
After slightly more than a month of summer vacation, more than 1,200 students in Atlanta returned to school last week. The kids at Boyd, Centennial Place and Hutchinson elementary schools are the only public school students in the metro area that attend on a so-called year-round calendar — where children start earlier in the summer (July 16) and end later in the spring (June 6) than usual.
Basically, the students attend on a quarterly schedule with lengthy, three-to-four-week breaks between, or during, each quarter.
One of the theories behind the year-round schools movement is that the students will need less review — and will therefore learn more — if they avoid the months-long summer break where there’s the ever-present danger of “learning loss.”
Year-round schooling has not been a popular option here, at least for public schools. According to information from the Georgia Department of Education, only two public school systems in the state — Atlanta and Muscogee County — operate year-round campuses.
Fulton County had two year-round campuses. But officials there decided to switch College Park and Parklane elementary schools back to a traditional calendar for the coming school year.
Spokeswoman Susan Hale told me that administrators hadn’t found any “strong” evidence that student achievement improved because of the unique calendar. Of course, there are a variety of reasons that could explain why Fulton’s foray into year-round schooling failed — including that, according to Susan, student attendance was typically low during the first few weeks of the school year.
Could it be that the success or failure of year-round schools — like many education initiatives — depends largely upon one thing: Parental buy-in?
