Source: NC Newsline
A resistance to a controversial school calendar law is growing amongst school districts across North Carolina. Currently, the state’s school calendar law favors the travel and tourism industry’s preference of a break that encompasses August.
However, education groups, schools districts and families have viewed this law as a burden for years.
According to WRAL, education groups have noted that an early-August start would allow high school exams to be scheduled before winter break, it aligns with the community college calendar, and makes it easier for more high school students to get a head start on undergraduate work or occupational training.
In addition, the calendar law is specifically targeted at public school districts, as the law does not apply to private schools, including those that accept voucher students from the Republican-sponsored Opportunity Scholarship program.
“Traditional public schools are the only schools subject to the calendar statute and its late August start date,” Carteret County said in its statement after a court ruling on the calendar law.
“This forces traditional high schools to either end their semesters in mid-January after the winter break, or have a significantly shortened fall semester. Neither are ideal for our students’ academic achievement, yet they are our only practical choices.”
Carteret County is the latest school board forced to defend its school calendar in the courts, as 29 of North Carolina’s 115 school districts planned to start classes in early to mid-August this year without state permission.
According to WRAL, the Carteret County School Board argues that restricting school start and end dates violates the state constitution’s promise of a “uniform” public education system, and underscored how hundreds of schools — including charters, innovation high schools, certain low-performing schools, and some schools in western North Carolina — don’t have to follow the calendar law.
WRAL reports that the Carteret board argues that its system should be afforded the same flexibility, and that their early start date would help students take community-college classes that tend to start in early August.
Other school districts, including Granville County Schools, Moore County, and thousands of parents across the state are advocating for calendar flexibility.
A 2024-2025 Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools survey to the public found that 3,000 of the more than 4,000 respondents — a mix of parents, staff, and students – preferred an early start, as opposed to the state calendar law’s late start.
