At his news conference on Friday Governor Northam will announce schools will be extended into the summer and possibly next year Virginia will begin year-round schools. Both are aimed at helping students who have fallen behind during the COVID pandemic.
From insidenova.com:
“We’re working with our teachers, our school boards, our superintendents. It has to be a top priority,” he (Northam) said.
“Our parents need to (sic) break too. We’ve asked a lot for the past year from our children and their families and now it’s time for us to help them, to help them out, to give them some extra time this summer to get them prepared will be in everybody’s best interest.”
Year round schooling has not yet been approved but it is expected to be and could begin as early as next year.
More here.
(Why are our schools still on an agrarian schedule? Why do school buildings sit idle for 1/4th of the year while school boards scream for more money to build more schools? Many school districts use their schools year-round and prevent the need for new schools. And many parents love it when their children go to school for nine weeks and then a break for three weeks. Families can take vacations in the Fall, Winter, or Spring. No summer breaks for 11 weeks giving students plenty of time to forget what they learned over the previous year, forcing schools to spend the first month or two in the Fall repeating the previous year’s learning.
Year-round school can be done although teacher’s unions will never support it so it’s not likely Democrats will support it. We’re stuck with this agrarian schedule when children no longer have to work on farms and we’re stuck with paying for new schools while the schools we have sit empty for a quarter of the year. Try to imagine any business closing down for 1/4th of the year and then building a new building to accommodate their expanding business. It’s ridiculous, and costly, that we don’t use our schools full-time.)
