We use imprecise language when talking about the time between the first and last days of the annual school calendar. I hesitate to use the words “school year” because a school year is not a year. It is not even close. To paraphrase the message at the bottom of the passenger side mirror of your vehicle, “on the first day of school the last of day of learning is closer than you think.”
PI 8.01(2)(f) of the Wisconsin Administrative Rules states that a school year shall be a minimum of 180 days. Because time is money and school money is largely payroll, school boards seldom seek DPI permission to exceed 180 days. Hence a school year begins with 180 days, fewer than half of the days in a calendar year (365).
The advent of the digital age makes school calendars very visible. One need only tap into a school’s web site to find a display of the annual school calendar. School boards approve an annual school calendar, however this calendar always is constructed using the days instruction is to be provided. “Provided” is a hypothetically legal number and is not close to the number of days of actual instruction.
The rule goes on to say that a maximum of five (5) days of the 180 may be counted to meet the required 180 even if children are not in school. These five days may be used for parent-teacher conferences or be days in which school is cancelled due to inclement weather, the proverbial snow days. Even before school begins, the instructional calendar contains only 175 days.
From this point of 175 days, the school calendar falls victim to the realities of public education. Educational accountability calls for testing and testing takes time. Wisconsin requires all children in grades 3 through 8 plus 10 to complete an annual statewide academic assessment. Most schools use three to four days for mandated fall testing. Secondary schools also use the equivalency of one day each semester for final exams. High school children take the PLAN, AccuPlacer, PSAT and ASVAB tests on school days. Testing usually reduces another five days from the instructional calendar. Now, there are 170 days for instruction.
Just because the web site calendar shows that all other days are available for instruction does not necessarily make it so. Schools are required to conduct safety drills. Most schools conduct one fire drill each month and one tornado/weather emergency drill in the fall and one in the spring. Because schools have been the sites of tragic violence, security drills also are conducted. Some of these are “secure and hide” rehearsals and others practice school evacuation procedures. Public confidence in child safety at school requires these drills and rehearsals. Good school administrative practices distribute these events across the hours of a school day so that children know what to do wherever they are in the school house. Good practices also distribute the distraction these events create. Drills will account for an aggregate of two days of instruction. Now, there are 168 days.
School assemblies are distributed across the annual calendar. Some are connected with specific dates. Veterans Day and Martin Luther King, Jr. Day are examples of an annual historical, cultural observance involving children in school. In-school rehearsals for school musicals, concerts and plays reduce instructional time. In elementary schools, instructional focus wears thin in the days before Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas as those events become in-school class room themes. In Wisconsin, many high school boys are absent in the fall for the opening day of deer hunting season. It is Wisconsin culture!
Class field trips use and lose time for instruction. History teachers make good use of time dedicated for a trip to a regional museum. However, the time required for the history event takes children out of their math and science and language arts instruction as well as art, health, music and physical education.
Assume that two or three days of the calendar are used for school assemblies and field trips and now there are less than 165 days for instruction.
Good and continuous teaching causes children to learn. Good teaching requires the continuous presence of a good teacher. Even though a teacher prepares lesson plans for a substitute teacher to follow in the regular teacher’s absence, the absence of the child’s regular teacher disrupts the continuity of instruction. This does not denigrate the work of substitute teachers. Children, however, respond differently to a substitute teacher and a substitute teacher responds differently to each child. Teacher absences for personal illness and emergencies average five to eight days each school year. Absences for professional training average four to six days each school year. Teacher absence reduces the number of effective teacher-student instructional days to 154.
Equal to a teacher’s absence, if a child is absent from school, the child is absent from instruction. While it is true that class instruction continues in the absence of children every day, the absent child does not receive that instruction until she returns to school. It used to be that when a child was not in school it was because the child was ill. Not true today. Wisconsin Rules allow a parent to excuse a child from school for up to ten (10) days each school year without providing a reason for the absences. The frequency of absences varies greatly child to child, however, perfect attendance is a rarity and most children are absent an average of seven to fifteen days annually.
The number of days for teacher-child instruction now is less than 150. Fewer than 150 is the number of effective instructional days for most children. So, let’s put this calendar and instructional intent into propositional statements.
A child has less than 150 learning episodes in which to add a grade level of reading achievement.
A child has less than 150 learning episodes in which to learn Algebra or Chemistry or World History or Spanish 1.
A teacher has less than 150 learning episodes in which to cause a child to learn the designated Common Core Standards for the child’s grade level.
Together, teacher and child have less than 150 learning episodes to cause the child to perform at a competent level on the next annual state assessments.
Ouch! One hundred fifty is not very many. In fact, 150 episodes is the equivalency of 124 hours of instruction because a school’s class periods typically are 50 minutes in duration. Double ouch!
Only in school can less than 150 days or less than 124 hours be called a year.