Moms Pro: Opening School Before Labor Day

On January 27th Virginia State House Bill number 1433 died in subcommittee. The purpose of the bill, sponsored by Delegate Thomas A. Greason ( R)-House district 32, would have been to give local school boards the power to open schools before Labor Day. Since 1986, a Virginia law, known as “The Kings Dominion Law” because of the backing it receives from the Virginia Travel and Tourism industry, has kept Virginia schools from opening prior to Labor Day.

A recent FCPS survey found that that a majority of parents and FCPS employees support the idea of opening schools before Labor Day. The McLean Citizens Association Education Committee also supported the bill.

When the public school system opens and closes can have a significant impact on families, even those with children in private schools. The timing, availability and cost of family vacations, summer camp and day care are among the issues that are often affected by the public school calendar.

The McLean Patch Mom’s have been considering the pros and cons of opening school before Labor Day.

McLean Patch Mom, Alison Senold, has two elementary school children in FCPS:

Pro: Schools that open before Labor Day have more time to prepare students for SOL, AP and IB exams than schools that open after Labor Day.

I love summer vacation as much as my kids do, but I support the idea of starting school before Labor Day and ending a week earlier in June. My kids take their SOL exams in mid to late May. It isn’t really fair to say that school seems to stop after SOL’s.

I believe my kid’s teacher’s work hard every day of the school year, but it’s no secret that something changes after SOL’s. Call it a collective relaxation or sigh of relief that takes place among the teachers and students. After SOLs, the kids are able to enjoy learning without the pressure of preparing for a high stakes, state wide assessment test and that’s terrific.

But an additional week of instructional time on the front end of the school year would give them invaluable preparation time and ease some of the concerns about winter weather disrupting a tight schedule of learning.

Many other schools districts in the region open before Labor Day. I have to assume they choose to do so, at least in part, to gain that additional instructional time before SOLs or AP/IB exams. As long as school closes a week earlier in June, we would still have our nice long summer break.