Our long summer break is an anachronism, and it’s hurting our children relative to their peers in other parts of the world. The benefits of year-round schooling to students are obvious and proven. We experienced this while living overseas, and it is a much better way to keep kids engaged in learning. Teachers may initially resist this, but properly engaged they will help implement this so all stakeholders emerge as winners. The vacation lobby will complain, but districts can stagger schedules as is done with Spring Breaks. Let’s design a year-round option for teachers and parents for 2014 as a way of moving towards this.

In his Nov. 24th Talk of the District, Superintendent Tom Nelson lays out his arguments for the middle school model; in doing so, he also demonstrates why sixth graders should not be placed in a junior high with ninth graders, and why the proposal to move the sixth graders from Rutherford and Lake Elmo to the junior highs next year should NOT be considered. In his words, "ninth graders are high school students...earning (high school) credits...participating in high school activities and athletics." He also states that "most ninth graders are physically mature and emotionally ready to attend...high school." Based on this argument, sixth graders certainly don't belong with ninth graders. The superintendent goes on to say that "middle schools provide a space in the middle between the pressure of a high school experience and the safe and secure experience of an elementary school" and that "middle schools are an...exploratory part of a young person's development." Following the same argument, placing sixth graders with ninth graders who are emotionally and developmentally ready for high school certainly does not provide the sixth graders with a safe place away from the pressures of high school! In summary, the Superintendent says that programming should not be dictated by facilities, but by "what makes the best educational sense for our students." Therefore, these sixth graders should NOT be moved to the junior highs next year to relieve overcrowding of their schools without taking into account what makes sense for them, which is waiting until a district-wide implementation of the middle school model.