Politics Aside, Are There Any Practical Reasons Why The American School Year Is Not Nine Months Long?

Let me start by saying how much I love the fact that this subreddit automatically capitalizes each word in the title; it's absolutely wonderful!

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The current nine-month school year came about from a need to get kids back home to help with harvest, but it's been a long time since that's been true. These days, the shorter year causes a burden on teachers who must support themselves all year long while only earning money for nine months' worth of work. It also causes a burden on the parents it was supposed to assist since young children require paid supervision in the summer months now that most families have a working mother and father.

Besides the financial burden caused by the shorter school year, there is also the children's quality of life to consider. Right now, school related stress peaks during midterms and finals as both students and teachers attempt to cram as much information as they can in a few short months. A longer school year could potentially relax the pacing of education and offer more opportunities for those who need additional attention and remedial work.

With kids in school all year, they would have less time to be idle and get into trouble. A lot of the negative relationships kids make are established and strengthened during the summer as they start making friends based solely on their geographic location instead of their academic goals and abilities. This strengthens insular world-views (a.k.a. cliques) and makes children less likely to create relationships with people that are different in almost every way except academics.

There are more reasons I could list why a year-long school year would be better that the current nine month year, but I think that the financial, academic, and social aspects are plenty with which to prove the point. Are any of these arguments invalid? Are there any arguments to support a nine month school year? What do you think are the barriers to change on this subject?

Submitted June 25, 2017 at 03:21PM by racas http://ift.tt/2s5ZGXu