Guest opinion: Students could benefit from an expanded school year
To the Lee County Community:
During the recent State of our Schools address, I made mention of the potential benefits of increasing the number of days students are in school. The reason was to point out that comparing the United States with other countries in terms of student academic achievement wasn’t a fair comparison, given the length of their school calendar versus ours. A number of inquiries from parents and citizens about this suggest that our community may be interested in hearing more about this topic.
For too long, some have compared student achievement in the U.S. with that of students across the globe. While we share some things in common – length of school day, teachers with comparable credentials and expertise and similar school facilities – the most remarkable difference is that those nations have longer school calendars than the U.S. Japan and China have more than 220 student days each year; in fact, most of the countries used to compare student performance with the U.S. have a calendar with an average of 193 days. Given the state of the global economy, we might not want to wait too long to begin catching up.
I’m fully aware that full-blown year-round school calendars have repeatedly proven to be unpopular and ineffective in Floridaand in other states. Such costly schemes have been shown over and over again to burn out teachers, to leave students with no opportunities for any other fruitful pursuits, and to put unnecessary strains on families. At this time, I can see no need to retry those failed experiments.
I share with many other educators, students, and parents a certain fatigue with the endless stream of well-intentioned but often poorly-designed school “reform” measures that come from Tallahassee and Washington year after year after. Our District strives to be conservative and thoughtful about any new programs or initiatives we consider above and beyond the constant stream of non-negotiable demands from state and federal authorities.
There are plenty of good reasons to think that our current 180-day student calendar isn’t sufficient to accomplish all of the education goals we set for students and schools in the modern world. It’s time for us to think about giving more time to our students and teachers.
The standards and accountability revolution has put immense emphasis on reading, writing, and mathematics, and, to a far lesser extent, science. Although these subjects are unquestionably essential, they’re not all that’s needed. If we extended our 180 day calendar just a little – perhaps to 190 or 200 days – we would be able to provide additional opportunities to enhance subjects like art, music, history and international languages, just to name a few.
These additional days would enable teachers to provide a richer variety of experiences for students, with more time for complex laboratory experiences, guest speakers, and team projects that make lessons come to life. This would lead struggling students to a higher rate of success, and provide a fuller, deeper education for all students. A slightly longer school year would ease the pressure to rush some lessons in order to be ready for high stakes end-of-course examinations.
We have asked our students and teachers to do so much more now than we have ever asked before. The state’s new high school graduation requirements and curriculum standards facing us are more rigorous and more challenging than they have ever been, but we’re still somehow expecting all of this to happen in the same 180-day calendar that we used 100 years ago.
If we want to fairly compare our students with those across the globe, I think we all agree that we need to start with a level playing field. A longer school year for students may be a good place to start.
– James W. Browder, Ed.D.
is superintendent of schools for the School District of Lee County