“By 2012, education groups estimate, more than 5 million pupils — about 10 percent of all children enrolled in American public schools — could be going to school year-round” (Johnson). Year round school is a very controversial topic around the United States. Every school should be a year round school because students retain more information and are able to regenerate more often throughout the year. Others believe it causes too many problems in finding childcare over the breaks but most daycares will work with the schools to accommodate. Year round school is beneficial to teachers, students, and parents.

To begin with, year round school works because it helps students retain more information. Retaining more information leads to better grades. In the traditional school system, students come back and teachers are forced to review the previous year’s material. This can take anywhere from a couple days to two or three weeks. Dr. Charles Ballinger is the executive director of the National Association for Year-Round School and was quoted in an article by Ann Svensen. He stated,” Students retain more when breaks between instruction are shorter, and teachers don’t need to spend much time on review” (Ballinger in Svensen). Ballinger is saying how the year round school system eliminates the need to have review time which gives students an opportunity to learn more information throughout the year overall. In addition, when schools choose to change to the year round school calendar, they see higher scores on tests and grades in general. This is only possible from the students retaining more and more information from their previous years in the school. Robert Haeberlin is a school principle and his school recently switched to the year round calendar. He was interviewed by Miles O’Brien. In the interview Haeberlin was asked, “What is good, necessarily and intrinsically, about having kids in school more on a year-round basis and not more attuned to the agrarian calendar” (O’Brien)? He said, “The advantage is that we have found, have been improved student achievement based on test scores, improved student discipline, improved student attendance, and also it offers teachers more time to do staff development activities and gives them more time to reflect back on the school year” (Haeberlin in O’Brien). In other words, it has been proven that when a district switches from the traditional calendar to a year round one, performance of students rises. Retaining more information leads to less review time and better grades; and those are two great reasons all schools should be on a year round schedule.

Continuing on, when students attend the year round school schedule, they are able to regenerate more frequently. Since there are more breaks students and teachers have a chance to refresh more often. Lauren Penderson is a college student who is taking a course on Instructional Strategies and Reflection. In her class she had to write a paper on year round schooling. She quotes in the paper, “The frequent vacation breaks helps curtail fatigue and maintain enthusiasm in learning. These breaks help reduce the burn out of teachers and students” (Penderson). In the traditional school system there are three main breaks: summer, winter, and spring. Those breaks are different lengths of time and are not spread out evenly throughout the year. When students get more breaks they stay involved in what they are learning. So in other words, students do not get senioritis or lose focus. Also, the year round school system makes vacation planning much easier. Most parents do not get off the whole summer like their kids do so more frequent breaks allows more flexibility for trips. Pederson also stated in her paper, “This allows parents to schedule vacations that are more convenient for them and their work schedule” (Penderson). Hot vacation spots may also be less crowded because not every kid in the world is off at the same time. Year round school in general makes things more convenient and allows students and staff of the schools to regenerate more often.

On the other hand, many people are against the year round school system. They believe the traditional school system makes it easier to find day care because there are camps in the summer. Changing the school schedule leads to the unavailability of daycare over the different breaks. It also makes it harder when parents have multiple kids on different schedules. A study done by the United States Department of Education found “Timing also gets tricky for families who have children on different schedules, and kids may miss out on traditional summer activities, such as camp” (U.S. Department of Education in Svensen). Camp is like a break from school and students in the year round school miss out on the opportunity to participate in it. Even with this argument, most daycares will adjust their schedules to accommodate kids who are in the year round school system. Karen Waugh is the spokesperson for the Kentucky Department of Education. In Svensen’s articles she stated, “The YMCA and other daycare providers in her state have altered their schedules to accommodate the growing number of kids on year-round schedules” (Waugh in Svensen). If most schools in a particular area are year round, the daycares have to adjust so they get kids and then make money. Donna Bartley is a mother with two kids, one in year round school, says “I have one child in daycare full time and one in year round school. Now I can break up the amount of time that both kids need care, instead of paying for one long stretch over summer” (Bartley in Svensen). Year round school helps ease the amount daycare costs throughout the year. It is spread out and doesn’t require a huge amount of money to dish out just in summer. Year round school makes finding daycare easier and more cost effective.

All in all, all schools should switch to the year round system. The number of schools switching is on the rise because it helps students retain more information and it allows them more times throughout the year to refresh. Others believe year round school causes issues with daycare, but that is not true because almost all daycares will accommodate students in the year round system. Year round school is a very important topic because it may not be long until all schools make the switch. Parents and educators should step away from the traditional school system and learn more about year round school.

Works Cited
Johnson, Alex. "Year-round School Gains Ground around U.S. - U.S. News - Life - Msnbc.com." Breaking News, Weather, Business, Health, Entertainment, Sports, Politics, Travel, Science, Technology, Local, US & World News - Msnbc.com. 27 Oct. 2010. Web. 25 Feb. 2011. <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39748458/ns/us_news-life/>.
O'Brien, Miles. "CNN Transcript - Saturday Morning News: Can Year-Round Schooling Help Students Excel? - February 3, 2001." CNN.com - Breaking News, U.S., World, Weather, Entertainment & Video News. 3 Feb. 2001. Web. 23 Feb. 2011. <http://archives.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0102/03/smn.16.html>.
Penderson, Lauren. "Year Round Schooling: Good or Bad." Home. 28 Apr. 2006. Web. 25 Feb. 2011. <http://ematusov.soe.udel.edu/final.paper.pub/_pwfsfp/00000116.htm>.
Svensen, Ann. "Evaluating the Year-Round School System - FamilyEducation.com." School Resources & Educational Help By Grade & Subject For Parents - FamilyEducation.com. Web. 22 Feb. 2011. <http://school.familyeducation.com/school/alternative-education/38452.html>.