I live in a suburb of Raleigh, North Carolina, and my children attend year-round school. I have one daughter in a year round middle school, and two daughters in a year round elementary school. This kind of school system has been an option for families here since the early 1990s. Wake County decided to operate any newly build elementary school on a year-round schedule starting in 2007.
In a year-round school, students are organized into four groups, called “tracks”. The schedules for each track are staggered so that at any one time, three tracks are in school and one track is out on break. This system is called a “45/15 Schedule”: students are in school for 45 days, then they’re off for 15, in different cycles throughout the year.
The new school year begins begins the first Monday in July for students on tracks 1, 2 and 3. Students on track 4 start school 15 school days later as students on track 3 “track out” for their first 15 day break. Year-round students get the same holidays off as students in “traditional calendar schools”, and all students are in school for 180 days each year. It’s quite a feat to accomplish that, I think. I’m grateful I don’t have to make the schedules!
My children are on “track 4”, which means that they have 3 week vacations in January, April, July, and October. When my oldest began on track 4, she stayed there, and my subsequent children attending the elementary school were automatically assigned to her same track, without any special forms or influence from me. The only complaint I have about the schedule is that they are out for their longest break in the dead of winter. Christmas vacation begins around the 20th of December, and they don’t go back to school until the third week in January.
Depending on where you live in Wake County, when you register your child for school, you’re usually given a “traditional calendar” school option as well as a “year-round calendar” school option. If you’re only given one or the other, you can easily apply for a transfer to the nearest school that has the calendar you want. There are also a plethora of magnet/special focus schools, private schools, and Montessori schools to choose from.
The Advantages of Year Round:
1. Schools can accommodate approximately 33 percent more students in one school. For every three schools on a multi-track, year-round schedule, one fewer school has to be built.
2. Having year round school lessens the amount of learning loss that occurs after a long summer break. There is not really any conclusive evidence that this type of school schedule has an effect on achievement, but there is less necessity for remediation with shorter breaks.
3. Air conditioning, at least in our schools in Wake County, North Carolina.
The Disadvantages:
1. It can be challenging to make daycare and before/after school care arrangements for track-out periods. However, because of the length of time Wake County has implemented this calendar, there are many options for “track out camps” for children on a year round schedule. The local YMCAs offer the most popular such camp for each track of students each time they track out. The local rollerskating rink also offers a track out camp, There are martial art academies that offer track out camp, some dance studios, and a kids’ cooking school too.
There are a multitude of academic track out camps here, and my second oldest has attended an art track out camp. The camps may be week-long or last the entirety of the track out time and operate from the beginning to the end of the school day, so that working parents don’t have to make any other special arrangements. The businesses that offer track out camp try to keep their prices as affordable and competitive as any summer vacation length daycare/day camp would be for those students whose parents work full time during their long summer break.
2. It can be difficult to schedule around other family members’ summer vacations, and, while not a common problem, the possibility exists for siblings to be scheduled on different tracks or calendars.
3. Inclement weather make-up days are on on Saturdays (half day), because no track can add days to the end of their school year.
My children haven’t ever been in a school that operated on the traditional calendar, so they don’t have any sense of missing out on a three month school break. We spend time at the pool after school in the summer, and we take trips to visit family during their 3 week track out breaks for spring and fall. They enjoy the frequent breaks from academics, and I enjoy having them home often. But like most other families, we’re all ready for them to be back in school when track out is over!
What questions do you have for me as a parent of children that attend year-round school? Has your district suggested or implemented year round schooling? Would you be willing to try it if it was offered?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog from Frelle, in North Carolina. Come visit her at MadeMoreBeautiful.com
Photo credit to www.schoolworkhelper.net
Frelle (USA)
Jenna grew up in the midwestern US, active in music and her church community from a young age. She developed a love of all things literary thanks to her mom, and a love of all things science fiction thanks to her dad. She left the midwest in her early twenties and has lived in the south ever since.
On her blog, she tries to write words that make a difference to people. Long before she attended college to major in Special Ed and Psychology, she became an advocate for special needs and invisible disabilities. She's always been perceptive of and encouraging to those who struggle to fit in. Having been through several dark seasons in her own life, she's found empowerment in being transparent and vulnerable about her emotions, making deep and lasting friendships, and finding courage to write from her heart. Her biggest wish is to raise her kids to be compassionate people who love well.
She's been online since 1993, with a total of 19 years of social media exposure. Having friends she doesn't know in real life has been normal for her since her junior year in college, and she's grateful every day for the ways technology helps her stay in touch with friends from all over the world.
Jenna lives in a suburb of Raleigh, North Carolina, and is a freelance writer and a stay at home single mom to 3 girls and a boy. She blogs at MadeMoreBeautiful.comMadeMoreBeautiful.com.
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This is the first time I’ve ever heard of a school with different “tracks”, and I find it very interesting. I live in South Africa and (in some areas) overcrowding in schools is a huge problem. Here your children have to go to the Public School in their own neighbourhood (unless you can afford the exorbitant fees of a Private School).
Like you said, having children in different tracks would accommodate more learners. The main reason why I doubt it would ever be implemented here is because of the Teacher’s Unions. Here the school year is divided into 4 terms with a holiday between each one which is usually between 1 week and 3 weeks in length. However, the holiday at the end of the year is about 6 weeks. The school year starts around the 20th of January and ends around the 6th of December (which is Summer down here!). Teachers are used to all these breaks and I doubt very much they’d be willing to give them up for your version of year round school!
I have never heard of this approach either, but I can see how it could work really well for a different reason than those you’ve included: child health. We have 10-11 week terms here in New Zealand and usually during one of the last two weeks of term, especially during the winter, our boys inevitably get ill. With the seven week in/three week out cycle, I imagine a lot of that is prevented.
Really neat, Frelle. I have heard of year-round school, but I had never heard it explained before. My daughter’s school in NJ, USA is traditional, whereas she has the 2 and 1/2 month summer break, which was originally started because the kids had to help their families with summer harvest way back when.
I’m curious to hear what school calendars are like around the world!
Great post!
Jen 🙂
My kids go to school year-round. I’d have to count it up to be positive, but I’m pretty sure they go more than 180 days. School starts in April, lets out at the end of July for a five-week break, starts again at the beginning of September (although this break is getting gradually shorter,) out again for a couple of weeks around New Year’s, and the last break is a bout ten days between school years. During every break except the one between grades, the kids are laden with homework. Summer, especially, is not a time to be care-free and lie in the grass. In the week or so leading up to a break, kids come home from school right after lunch for a few days, then before lunch for a few more. The start-back period is the same, they go for a few half-days to ease back into their regular schedules. This is a big part of the reason so many women in Japan find it hard to get back to work, even after their kids start school! The schedule is erratic, and changes from year-to-year.
I lived in NC a bit growing up (my Dad went to seminary near where you are,) and attended grades K-4 at NC public schools. Even back then there was talk of year-round-schools, but I didn’t realize they were actually doing it! Sounds interesting, though it must have brrn a headache to get everyone used to it.
Oh, this is such an interesting post and topic, girl! I loved learning more about year round school – you did a fabulous job of highlighting the pros and cons!
(I’ve never taught or mothered at one!)
Thank you so much for publishing this! We are considering a move to Wake County, and even after reading the Wake County Schools’ website and some of the individual school websites, I didn’t understand it until now. Thanks again!