The idea of school becoming year-round has become more and more popular in recent years. Despite its recent surge in popularity, the idea of a year-long school schedule is not a new one. The first documented school to adopt the schedule was Schafer Park Elementary School in California. Several other states, such as Texas, Utah and both Carolinas, have recently moved to year-round school schedules. Opting for this alternate schedule over a standard one comes with many pros and cons.

One of the main upsides to running schooling year-round is that there is minimal time for students to lose their learning. Over an extended summer break, many students may forget many of the lessons they learned during the previous year. Without this extended vacation time, school lessons remain accessible in students’ memories.

However, despite the lack of an extended break, students will get breaks more often throughout the year. This can help to reduce the possibility of burnout for both teachers and students. Rather than having just about three long breaks during the year, students could look forward to several long-term breaks dispersed throughout the year.

Year-long schedules are also beneficial for families with parents who work during the summer. Rather than finding childcare for the whole summer, children would be supervised at school year-round. Additionally, households that struggle to afford proper food for their children could take advantage of free lunch programs year-round rather than just nine months out of the year.

Conversely, year-round schedules may cause many challenges to arise for districts and families. The most obvious of which is the inevitable scheduling conflicts. With such sporadic breaks, scheduling family vacations, summer camps and other summer-time activities is infinitely harder with a year-round schedule. Students who attend year-round schooling might also miss out on summer employment opportunities. Some families rely on the extra money that their children are able to bring in during the summer. Being stripped of this oppourtunity could be deleterious to myriad families. 

Additionally, running a school building year-round is incredibly expensive. Cooking lunch, air conditioning, if the school has one, and other maintenance costs really stack up over the course of a full year.

Furthermore, fewer longer-lasting breaks versus more shorter-duration breaks is ultimately up to personal preference. Students and teachers may be more susceptible to burnout if there is no extended summer break, rather than having more frequent short breaks.

Not to mention how difficult the transition would be from a standard to a year-long schedule. Restarting the education cycle provides challenges of its own, let alone potential backlash from students, their families and even teachers.

For many districts, the pros outweigh the cons, and a transition to year-long schooling is in order. For others, the challenges and downsides pose too big a threat, and a standard schedule remains in place. Before deciding whether or not a district should move towards year-long schooling, many pros and cons should be considered, as there is a plethora of each.