![Junior Grant Levins sprints down the track. "I'm here to try out because I love the sport of track and field and I'm working on my 800 [meter] time. Just trying to get better," Levins said.](https://www.wjpitch.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/g82ehdhTRiNswrE8gfn0tL9VRz7fuAnaiIKPCaOI-1200x900.jpg)
The Montgomery County Board of Education released three proposals for the 2020-2021 school calendar at a meeting earlier in October. Last spring, the Maryland General Assembly voted to override Governor Larry Hogan’s bill that mandated public schools to start school after Labor Day. MCPS now has more flexibility with the 2020-2021 school calendar because school can start before Labor Day and end after June 15.
Each of the proposals include 182 student instructional days, a full spring break (a total of six non-instructional days that includes two weekends) and a full day off for professional days at the end of each quarter. If MCPS goes over the allotted snow days they embed into the calendar then the school year could possibly be extended or some of the additional professional days could become school days.
In a poll, 49.2% of WJ students who responded preferred proposal two.
“I like proposal two just because… it looks like to me that is closed on more days and we start not to early, but not too late,” freshman Jayden Nichols said.
Fifteen perfect of students prefer proposal one\; however, the start and end date for school in that proposal stand out to teachers.
“I’m not a big fan of proposal one because it takes us really late into June,” English teacher Melanie MacFadden said.
MacFadden also prefers proposal two because students are used to starting school on a Tuesday.
Some students prefer the school calendars from recent years.
“I still like it the way it was before…but if the school board had to choose one it would be the second proposal where school starts on Sept. 1 and ends on June 18,” sophomore Tomi Ogunnusi said.
Ogunnusi likes how this year’s school calendar gives everyone a longer summer.
MCPS is asking for feedback through a survey on the proposed calendars before they decide on one later this year. The survey can be found below:
www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/calendar/proposed-calendar-2020-21.aspx
![Social studies teacher Timothy Rodman holds a production factory simulation in his AP Microeconomics class. "Students remember running for class president or the mock congress or the production factory much more so than learning topics like circular flow," Rodman said. "[The simulations make learning] very tangible and real and then students down the road are able to use it."](https://www.wjpitch.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/IMG_4420-1200x675.jpg)
