Ugh! I have never been a fan of starting early and ending the semester before the Winter Break.

Check out the 2010-2011 calendar adopted May 26, 2009.
block version: http://www.scps.k12.fl.us/student_calendar...l_block1011.pdf
text version: http://www.scps.k12.fl.us/student_calendar...al_text1011.pdf

Leave a comment to the blog post on orlandosentinel.com.
http://blogs.orlandosentinel.com/news_educ...mmer-break.html

-----

Seminole schools to have shorter summer break

posted by daveweber on December, 22 2009 4:19 PM

Remember when Seminole public school students and teachers had that extra long summer vacation in 2007, the year the district went to the later start date for the following school year by state mandate?

It’s payback time.

The district has gotten permission from the state to start the 2010-11 school year earlier. But this school year is ending late.

Result? The summer gets squeezed.

As I was doing year-end calendar planning stuff, it occurred to me that the current school year ends for students June 9. And the following school year begins Aug. 16.

That means kids get only nine weeks off this summer, and teachers, who have to stay a few days late to wrap up the show and arrive a few days early to prep for the new year, get even less.

Seminole school officials never did like the state’s requirement that the school year not start earlier than two weeks before Labor Day. The Legislature set the law a few years ago after complaints from parents that Florida’s school year started too early and cut into summer activities – summer camps, special courses, family vacations.

But Seminole liked to rev up those school air conditioning units and get classes underway in mid-summer – as early as July 31 one year. So the first chance it got to go back to an earlier start, it bolted.

That opportunity came because Seminole was named a “high performing” district by the state Department of Education, based on student performance on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test. One of the benefits of the status is to ignore the state law on later school start and begin the year when you darned well please.

The earlier start will allow the district to end the first semester at the winter break next year. Teachers, students and others had complained that carrrying the semester over into the new year – like most school children all over the nation have done for 100 years – means they have to worry about upcoming semesterexams over the winter break. This semester doesn’t end until Jan. 21.

Still, all may not be well with the calendar for next school year. To get in enough days in the first semester means kids will be going to school through Dec. 22, 2010 - just three days before Christmas. Teachers and administrators will have to work Dec. 23.

So this time next year expect to hear some really, really loud whining about how it’s Christmas and we’re still in school.