I noticed on the Today show that this is Education week and that President Obama shared his views on what will make our education system more competitive. His views revolve around the idea that, as a country, we need to lengthen our school year to an 11 month schedule. My first thought was that this is a ridiculous statement. Didn't we get into education so that we could have summers off and have two week Christmas vacations? Who does this guy think he is? Seriously though, it may be one of the only solutions that we as teachers will have if we continually complain about the lack of teaching time in order to prepare for the yearly tests that occupy the majority of our time.
I've always like the idea of a four day school week with during the regular school year; adding an hour or two a day to make up for the lost day would help with differential instruction. But adding two months would certainly make up for all time taken away teaching to the test. Think about it--more time in school means more time to teach everything from tying shoes to completing Bloom's taxonomy.
The sticky point about the view from the President is how will teachers be compensated for this extra time? Will teachers teach an extra two months out of the year out of the kindness of their heart? I doubt that very seriously. It is a job, and there are quite a few teachers who have to work a second job to make ends meet working 9 or 10 months out of the year. Like most ideas regarding education during an election cycle, this will probably get pushed under the rug, and deservedly so. Ideas like this should be kept as ideas unless there is financial backing to press it on. Would you ask a doctor to work two extra months out of the year without being compensated? Would a pilot agree to these terms? What about the secretary that writes these ideas in a government office? Think about the added cost to cool the schools during the summer and substitute teacher pay, bus drivers, cafeteria staff....these are all costs that will be added to a yearly budget that will have to be paid for regardless of teacher/administration/faculty pay. Our budgets are shoe string enough without the added time during summer and winter holidays.
First and foremost, I for one did not get into teaching for the summers off. I chose education so that I might make a difference in the lives of children. If you are going into education for the pay, I hate to tell you that you are going to be sadly disappointed. I for one have been a big proponent of year round schooling especially for those students in special education. Summers are often a huge step backwards for these students and it takes a good bit of time the next school year just recouping skills lost over the summer. Year round school still has some breaks built in with many school districts using the 9 weeks on 2 weeks off approach. This approach still has about 6 weeks in the summer that are off. Yes paying for this will always be the question especially since we are struggling to cover the current cost involved in education as it is. For students, it makes a lot of sense to look at alternatives to traditional school year approaches.
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