CHICAGO — Every September, teachers across the country spend the first several weeks of school doing the same thing: reteaching what students learned in May and forgot by August. Researchers call it the “summer slide.” Parents call it the reason their kids can no longer remember long division. I call it a design problem, and one we have the power to fix.
Our traditional school calendar, with a long summer break, is a holdover from a very different era. It persists mostly because it is familiar. I believe it is time for more districts to seriously test an alternative: a balanced, four-season calendar.
What a four-season calendar looks like
The idea is not to add school days. Most balanced calendars keep the same 180 days of instruction but rearrange them. Instead of a 10- or 11-week summer, students get a summer of about six weeks, plus two- or three-week breaks in the fall, winter and spring.
- Same number of school days: typically 180
- Shorter summer: about six weeks
- Longer seasonal breaks: two to three weeks each in fall, winter and spring
- Optional “intersession” weeks: for tutoring, enrichment or catch-up
Those intersession weeks are, to my mind, the most promising part. Districts that use them offer targeted help to students who are falling behind, while it is still early enough to matter, instead of waiting until summer school.
We don’t ask adults to work 40 straight weeks without a real break and then stop for three months. Why do we design childhood that way?
Ellen Park, metro and education editor
Hearing the objections
I have reported on education long enough to know that calendar changes are among the most emotional fights a school board can take on, and the objections are real. Parents worry, rightly, about child care during those seasonal breaks. Families with children in different districts may find themselves juggling incompatible schedules. Summer camps, youth sports leagues and teenagers with summer jobs all depend on the traditional break. Some older school buildings lack air conditioning, which makes classes in July a genuine hardship.
The research is also mixed. Studies of balanced calendars have generally found modest or inconsistent effects on overall test scores. Some show benefits for low-income students, who tend to lose the most learning over long summers; others show little difference.
So I am not arguing that every district should switch tomorrow. I am arguing that we should stop treating the current calendar as untouchable. A district could start with a few volunteer schools, partner with local recreation programs to cover breaks, and measure the results honestly over several years.
Families deserve a real voice in any such pilot. Surveys before and after the switch, public meetings held in the evening and clear plans for child care during breaks would go a long way toward building trust. A calendar imposed from the top will fail; one designed with parents and teachers has a fighting chance.
There are also benefits that test scores miss. Teachers in districts with balanced calendars often report less burnout, because regular breaks let them recover before exhaustion sets in. Attendance can improve, and families gain the option of traveling in the off-season, when prices are lower.
The calendar we have was built for a world of farm chores and no air conditioning. Our students live in a different one. The least we can do is try a design that might fit it better, and let the evidence, not habit, decide.
