Should or will Hamilton County schools have a fall break in 2021? This was a question on every school board member’s mind when the topic of a 2020-21 school calendar was brought up and discussed.
“When it comes to approving this calendar, we try to be a couple of years out,” said Superintendent Dr. Bryan Johnson. “But we always have the ability to make changes when appropriate or when we need to, and you can always bring recommendations you feel are needed to this forum.”
The superintendent spoke about the importance of having breaks within the school year, both for parents and teachers. For parents, these breaks allow them to go on vacations or other things such as that.
Hamilton County’s Chief of Staff for the Department of Education Nakia Towns and others wondered about the efficiency of having half-days in lieu of full days off. Another school board member spoke about how having half-days could be difficult on parents.
“The half days are planned at the halfway mark, so we have one each of the first three quarters,” said Ms. Towns. “This came out of the collaborative conferencing we did last year. We were asked for more planning time for teachers.”
School board member Jenny Hill said that there are several aspects to consider when doling out breaks for the school year. She listed budgets, teachers, and families as these factors. She also brought up the importance of making sure children were learning as much as they could when not on break.
“But always I want to know our time in school is maximized,” said Ms. Hill. “It seems like every year we have a conversation about the validity of taking time off at both thanksgiving and fall break. I love fall break as much as anybody, but is this the best thing for our children and learning for them to have this broken up schedule?”
Ms. Towns said the county has had multiple and comprehensive conversations about the practicality of having two extended breaks so close to one another. She said some advocate for a shorter fall break, while others believe a longer Thanksgiving break would be beneficial.
“We’ve had discussions over whether we need a fall break at all, and if we could just roll through to Thanksgiving there,” said Ms. Towns. “We had a conversation about how we came back from the winter break, as well as a conversation around spring break. When it came to spring break, it was around whether to align with the collegiate spring break, so what UTC and Chatt State do, rather than aligning with the Easter holiday, which is what private school tend to do.”
She told the school board that parents “overwhelmingly rejected” the idea of giving up a week-long fall break. She said there were even teachers and parents who floated the idea of putting a week-long fall and Thanksgiving break.”
In the proposed 2020-21 schedule, fall break is a week, and Thanksgiving sees students and teachers off for three days. In the first term, there are three proposed half days sprinkled in as well.
One school board member said that this calendar is malleable, which is an important detail in a post-COVID-19 world. She said the pandemic has caused people to think differently about school, and that schools may find that some schedules work better for students than traditional ones.
“I think the key point for us is that this is just a proposal, and that we can always come back and revisit it and make adjustments to it based on information available,” said Superintendent Johnson.