Obama would curtail summer vacation
Obama would curtail summer vacation
Students beware: The summer vacation you just enjoyed could be sharply curtailed if President Barack Obama gets his way. Obama says American kids spend too little time in school, putting them at a disadvantage with other students around the globe.
"Now, I know longer school days and school years are not wildly popular ideas," the president said earlier this year. "Not with Malia and Sasha, not in my family, and probably not in yours. But the challenges of a new century demand more time in the classroom."
The president, who has a sixth-grader and a third-grader, wants schools to add time to classes, to stay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.
"Our school calendar is based upon the agrarian economy and not too many of our kids are working the fields today," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said in a recent interview with The Associated Press.
Fifth-grader Nakany Camara is of two minds. She likes the four-week summer program at her school, Brookhaven Elementary School in Rockville, Md. Nakany enjoys seeing her friends there and thinks summer school helped boost her grades from two Cs to the honor roll.
But she doesn't want a longer school day. "I would walk straight out the door," she said.
Domonique Toombs felt the same way when she learned she would stay for an extra three hours each day in sixth grade at Boston's Clarence R. Edwards Middle School.
"I was like, 'Wow, are you serious?'" she said. "That's three more hours I won't be able to chill with my friends after school."
Her school is part of a 3-year-old state initiative to add 300 hours of school time in nearly two dozen schools. Early results are positive. Even reluctant Domonique, who just started ninth grade, feels differently now. "I've learned a lot," she said.
Does Obama want every kid to do these things? School until dinnertime? Summer school? And what about the idea that kids today are overscheduled and need more time to play?
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- Posted on September 29, 2009
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I think having three extra hours added to school is a bad idea. Kids need to spend time with friends & family. Also coming home everyday exhausted till its dinnertime. Summer is something we do to take break off from school, not to do more school. Maybe they should have something where the students can sign up if they would like to stay some extra hours after school, or go to summer school. But I personally don't like the idea of having more school.
This is so messed up! Most kids that I know would hate this, including me. The amount of school that we have now is plenty! Kids do have lives. For example, I ride horses, run track and play basketball right now. I do not have time for the president to make me go to school untill dinnertime!
This is a great idea. Summer is when we forget what we learned the entire year. I belive we should move to a 9 weeks all in and 2 weeks off. im a kid and i am saying this cause it would be benificial. There is pleanty of time to fool around in school and outside of it anyway.
This is an outrage to all students that go to public school. I do not think that we should have an extra 3 hours added on to school. A person like myself that participates in after school activities would have to drop those things for school. Basically all students would ever do is go to school. I do not think that this should happen.
I think that more ours for school is A bad idea.then some kids would want to be home schooled and some kids would like it or stop working on school work.That would also mean no homework ever.
Obama and his wife are just taking their job to a whole new level for absolutly no reason. the Obama family is way to full of them selves. There is no reason why we should have school Full year. Its okay, he wont be president long anyway. This article doesn't really affect us becasue the new election. Ron Paul 2012 .
Kids don't need more school they need classes they will use in life not just use less stuff that kids can only use if their going to become a math whiz or rocket scientist but the chances in that happening is 1 in 30 at least. Kids need to pic all the classes they want to prepare themselves for college or what ever they want to do in life. And I'm not only saying this because i don't like school I'm saying this because Ive asked my mom and dad for help on homework sometimes and almost every time they both say "sorry i have never used in in life so i don't remember how to do it." Obama needs to go test a normal citizen or two and i bet they wont get most of the problems that we are toght in school. Government people should tell schools to teach more of stuff we need to lern in school to be successful then stuff we wont use.
Kids do a ton of school work every day at school, and we also get a ton of homework after we came back from school for 6 hours. We also get homework on our days off. Sometimes even work during the summer for some kids, so i think we need our full time of summer so we can have some free time in our life.
No matter how much I love learning and school in general, I probably would also hate the prospect of having to stay in school for longer hours out of the day, and having to have school more days out of the year. I mean, isn't 180 days enough? If not, WHY NOT? If people really want to succeed in life, they could probably take some OPTIONAL summer courses- these courses are not regular class work and they should not be mandatory! Plus, school life can be a hassle, with having to get up and get ready for the day earlier than you normally would for in the summer or during spring break or Christmas break. Why push this hassle on students year-round without the breaks?!? This is just plain mismanaged and over-controlled by the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, WHICH SHOULDN'T MESS WITH THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE!!! Let the STATES and SCHOOL DISTRICTS decide what they want to do with their school year and the rest of their time. What the Fed is doing is not only invasive, it could even be unconstitutional- as the Constitution DOES say "All rights not specifically given to the federal government are reserved for the states and the people." The government is clearly overstepping this boundary and acting like they rule everything that goes on in this country- which they DON'T!! This country is "for the people, of the people, and by the people", not "of, by, and for the Senators and Representatives". By the way, did you know that in Greek, "senate" literally means "meeting of old men"? Now these old men in Washington are acting so irresponsibly that I REALLY hope they get pounded in the polls in November and lose their jobs- HARD! About time they get what's coming to them!
I am completely agianst this. As a junior in high school, I know what the immediate response would be from my peers, "NO!" I see students who, by the way, are already unhappy with the amount of time we spend in school as it is. How do you think they would respond if even more hours were tagged on? Some don't care now. So, I'm almost certain that adding on school hours would just make them care even less. And what about the ones who have jobs? The ones that HAVE to bring home a pay check to help their parents out with bills? That would either make their whole family suffer by preventing them from helping out, or cause that student to have very poor attendence, which, in turn, would make the whole thing pointless anyways because they wouldn't be at school to get "more time in the classroom".