First day of school

Why the hell do school boards feel it's necessary to start classes at the beginning of August? How many fucking days off are the little darlings getting now?

 

it seems like we've been hearing for decades about changing the school calendar. summer vacation is awesome when you're a kid but it's a remnant from the agrarian era.

not that i'm worried about it now but with a little one on the way and a wife who works full time, as will i, i don't really understand what the heck i'm supposed to do with the kid during the summer when she's too young to be by herself. i know there are tons of camps and stuff but i'm not in a field where i can take off in the middle of the day to go pick up the kid.

 

Mine don't start until after Labor Day, so it's another 2 weeks of fun.
My youngest starts full-time kindergarten so for the first time in 7 years, I will be child free during the day.
I know I'm going to miss them because they get out at 2:30, I go in to the paper at 3 and get home near midnight.
But we have the weekends and had a great summer.
It's going to be weird having the house to myself, well, except for the 2 cats my wife got the girls in June.

 

I envy you.

When my baby gets into full day school, I may end up changing jobs or beats in order to have my nights with them. I'm eagerly looking forward to being free of them, but man, I'm going to miss them.

 

They're not. They start school this early to maximize the number of days in school before the standardized tests. Why they can't move those, I don't know. But that's the main motivation. Gotta get those scores up, whether kids are actually learning or not.

Florida schools are only starting today because the state legislature mandated that school couldn't start more than two weeks before Labor Day. Last year, they were starting on the 3rd or 4th, and probably earlier than that. And the crying that went on from local school boards, you would not believe.