Governor Larry Hogan established an executive order on Aug. 31, 2016, that was later amended on Oct. 11, 2016 stating that Maryland’s public schools will start after Labor Day but still end around the same time as other state public schools.
The current school year is the first year that underwent Hogan’s executive order. The change in the school year calendar gave students and staff a longer summer break. To make sure make sure that Maryland public schools will end roughly around the same time as other state public schools the executive order cut out some days off and reduced the number of snow days.
Not all students agree with the new school calendar changes. One change the executive order did for the current school year was shorten spring break. Some students prefer a longer spring break compared to a longer summer break because, “it’s more useful to be able to destress in the middle of the school year rather than in the summer, when we don’t really need as much of a break from school,” freshman Emily Yuan said.
The executive order made by governor Hogan in 2016 will remain in effect for the upcoming school year and will be accompanied by some other changes to the calendar.
The upcoming school year consists of 182 days and will start on Sept. 4 and end on June 13. The changes are, “a shortened spring break; two closure days for planning and professional development; and two operational closures that coincide with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur,” according to MCPS.
The upcoming school calendar can be found online on the MCPS website. Other minor changes are that some of the days off are shifted. For instance winter break will be extended one day and the first quarter will now be the shortest quarter. The previous spring break was 10 days; spring break next year will only be six days.
Shortening spring break even more did not make some students happy, as, “that’s usually the time where most students start to prepare for AP exams and a time where they can focus on that and not have to worry about school work. Shortening spring break just creates more stress that a student may already have,” sophomore Angie Chan said.
Since the school start day will be after Labor Day again, the number of snow days that can be used will still be two, with the third day of cancelation resulting in an addition of a makeup day to the end of the school year. The first makeup day is scheduled on June 14, 2019.
With next year’s school calendar settled, MCPS sent out a survey on May 1 to parents and staff asking their opinion on which day’s school should be closed for religious and non-religious holidays. The survey closed on May 22 and the data from the survey will be used to help construct the 2019-2020 school year.