After reading the posts, it is obvious that the majority of people who support year-round schooling are parents who would rather not deal with their children. Parents who do and want to spend time with their children, intellectuals, and most importantly teachers (who spend more time with the children than their own parents) seem to agree that the summer break is necessary and beneficial.

Of course test scores are lower in September than in May. That doesn't mean the students have un-learned. They just need refreshed. And isn't that how the real world operates anyway? When you get a new job, you have to refresh your memory about material you learned as a freshman in college (or high school!). A good teacher can take care of that in a week or so.

Think about the kids. Stop being so selfish and cynical. Just because your life sucks doesn't mean kids should suffer the same. Their lives will suck soon enough.

Amen.

Do you have any idea how competitive it is outside of the USA? Our kids are going to have to compete with kids from all over the world for jobs soon (actually, the are already). I work at a Technical University. We have to send most of our American students to remedial mathematics (calculus) during their freshmen year. Our international students almost universally pass our math exam on the first try. Our international students all speak english, but few or our native students speak a secondary language.

I have my daughter travel a half hour to and from school each day so that she can attend a school that is rigorous enough in math. Hey, let your kids fall to the wayside. My daughter needs fewer competitors.

The math issue is a problem because the standards are watered down in public schools, not because kids don't go to school year-round. As a high school teacher I know that each year the standards are rewritten and tests are reworked so that districts can attain mandatory goals established by outsiders. 3 more months of mediocre instruction with crappy teachers will not fix your problem. It is much more complicated than that.

differnetEllen I am in total agreement with you. I am a second grade teacher and it doesn't matter how "good" you are at your job - even a week of review is a wasted week in this day. But in reference to whiny parent's comment - research has shown that it actually takes more like a month to regain that loss - and that is if the student has no learning disabilities or is not already at risk for failure. Come on, American kids are spoiled and it's really starting to show in thier attitudes and abilities.

Thank you so much! I am glad someone brought up that point. I started to say something similar and then just said forget it and never posted my response. differnetEllen I commend you for taking a stand and doing what you think is best for your daughter. It is a problem with both our substandard education (especially compared to the rest of the world!!) and the fact that we have too long a break for our spoiled American kids (as julanmat put it; well put by the way).

I don't know what the research data is or any statistics, but since I am a high school student let me say what all of says to me. THIS IS BULL S***!!! I hardly went to school last year and I still got straight A's in all my honors classes. If there hadn't been summer break to look foreward to I, and others like me, would have just quit. I've seen the kids who don't even get C's in their remedial class and it's because they don't care. I've also seen them try and the only time they did was when they got away from school for three months durring summer. The three month break invigorates myself and the other students. It's a needed psycological break from the opression that we face day in and day out. The teachers ride us all day long at school, the other students are total jack offs that do nothing but try to get you to hit first, and then we come home to parents that complain about how we don't get enough dicipline. My point is that the summer break is freedom. It is a time when kids get to be exactly that, kids. We are not yet mindless drones that go to eight hour a day dead end jobs. We are children that need to get outside and play sports, go on vacation, or just get away from everything. If that doesn't happen the the world will become like that of the book Brave New World and that is a hellish world I hope to never see which is, coincedentally, the end of society and thus the world.

No one has pointed out that US schools are expected to educate ALL children, not just the students who scored high enough on standardized tests, like some countries do. I have talked to exchange students from different countries who are surprised at the length of our school day and year. Their day in their home country is usually much shorter. MORE doesn't mean better. I read a proposal last year in a scholarly education journal suggesting that public schools should eliminate the senior year of high school because it's a waste; most students have earned the credits required for graduation and that students should begin taking college classes.