Fulton County students next year will get a few extra days of summer, after board members agreed Thursday night to a shorter school calendar.
The move makes Fulton at least the third system in the state to reduce the number of days kids go to school as a way to weather the recession and state funding cuts.
Starting in August, the 88,000 students in Fulton will attend class for 177 days -- three fewer days than the state's standard 180-day school year.
The board's approval is for one year only. System officials had recommended also adopting a 177-day calendar for August 2011. But board member Catherine Maddox said members want to first "see what effect it has" on the state's fourth-largest school system and its students.
Officials expect the shortened year to save Fulton $1.1 million annually.
Georgia lawmakers this year gave school systems the option to shorten their calendars, as long as students spent the same amount of time in instruction. For Fulton and other systems, that has meant plans to cut some school days and add from 10 to 30 minutes to each remaining day.
In rural north Georgia, Murray County officials in September began a 160-day school year they hope saves $124,000 this school year. In middle Georgia, Peach County responded to a $720,000 cut in state funding with a four-day school week. The county's 4,000 students now attend class Tuesday through Friday.
Fulton's decision means kids next year will start school Aug. 23. They will end the year May 27, 2011.
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