Rigdon Road Elementary, Columbus Georgia. 95 percent of the students here are from low-income families. Their tests scores are among the highest in the state. Principal Phyllis Jones says, “Our test scores have gone up tremendously in the last few years.”

One reason? Like thousands of schools around the nation, Rigdon Road became a year-round school.

Principal Jones says, “We thought at that particular time that our boys and girls did not need an entire summer out of school. They were losing a lot of information that we were teaching.”

Research from the University of Missouri shows, over the summer break, students typically forget one month of learning. Student Alexus Mack says, “When you’re in a traditional school year, it’s like, ‘I forgot that’, because you’re out so long. And some people really don’t focus on their education when they are out of school.”

Instead of summer vacation, students here get a three-week break, four times a year. Teacher Grace Williams says, “There’s less teacher burn-out. The students tend to retain more information. We have to do less re-teaching.”

With four breaks a year, students who fall behind can get extra help right away, without waiting until summer school. Principal Jones says, “Those intersession breaks make the difference. You can do so much more with a child when you have them right there immediately.”

She says becoming a year-round school has another advantage. “That keeps them off the street, so they are not vandalizing folks’ property, and they are not doing things that otherwise, during the summer months they have a tendency to…don’t have anything to do, so they get into trouble.”

Some students’ worst nightmares may be coming true, but it may not be as bad as they think. Year-round calendars are becoming more popular to many school systems as an alternative to the traditional nine-month school calendar. For many parents, however, this can be a very polarizing topic. Those supporting the year-round calendar tend to point to the fact that students will not lose the knowledge they’ve learned throughout the year if they continue on with school. They also believe the schedule works better for working parents. Parents opposed to year-round school believe the summer break is good for the students because it gives them time to unwind and be free of the pressures of school. They also point out that it’s unfair for some school systems to implement the year-round program for elementary and middle schools but not for high schools, especially when families have students at the different schools.

When deciding whether to support year-round schooling for your child, it is important to know the differences between it and the traditional nine-month school year. Consider the following points developed by experts at KidSource, ERIC Clearinghouse and the U.S. Department of Education concerning year-round school years:

• Year-round education is a concept that reorganizes the school year to provide more continuous learning by spacing the long summer vacation into shorter, more frequent vacations throughout the year. Year-round schools may be on a single-track or multi-track schedule. A single-track schedule generally calls for an instructional year of 180 days, with short breaks (intersessions) interspersed throughout the school year. A multi-track schedule staggers the instructional and vacation/intersession periods of each track throughout the entire year, so that some students are receiving instruction while others are on vacation.
• In a single-track 45/15 design, the year is divided into four nine-week terms separated by three-week vacations or intersessions. All students and teachers attend school for nine weeks (45 days), followed by a three-week vacation (15 days). This sequence is repeated four times each year. Alternatively, in a multi-track 45/15 system, students are normally divided into four groups. During a 12-week period, all students receive nine weeks of instruction and three weeks of vacation, but only three of the four groups are in school at one time, while the fourth group is on vacation. When the vacation group returns, another group leaves for a three-week vacation.
• In the multi-track configuration, the enrollment in existing schools can be increased by one-third, or, alternatively, current class size can be reduced. Moreover, proponents point out money that would otherwise have been spent on construction of new schools may be utilized to pay additional salary to teachers who elect to extend their contract on the multi-track year-round schedule. Therefore, the annual income of these teachers can conceivably be increased by one-third, and the effective supply of teachers can be increased by one-third.

The Public School Parent’s Network
KidSource
ERIC Clearinghouse
U.S. Department of Education