ALACHUA COUNTY, FL (352today.com) – This summer’s break is going to be a lot shorter for students at Alachua County’s Rawlings Elementary School. Alachua County Public Schools (ACPS) announced Wednesday Rawlings will be moving to a year-round schedule starting with the 2024-25 calendar year.
The district said the Florida Department of Education (FDOE) approved its requests for a year-round calendar at Rawlings while keeping Metcalfe Elementary on a traditional 10-month calendar.
Under the new year-round schedule, the first day of school for students at Rawlings Elementary will be Tuesday, July 16, 2024.
The district says under a year-round schedule, the school year starts earlier and breaks are distributed more evenly throughout the year. “That eliminates the long summer break that leads to what is commonly referred to as the ‘summer slide,’ the learning loss that comes with an extended period with no school,” said the district in a news release.
The complete year-round calendar is available here.
ACPS says families are being notified of the changes and will also receive information about how to request a zoning exception to allow their child to attend the elementary school with the calendar they prefer. This would allow students at Rawlings to move to Metcalfe and vice versa. Information on zoning exceptions is available on the district’s website.
ACPS says Rawlings and Metcalfe were among five schools in the state to receive approval to participate in the year-round school pilot program under a state law passed during the 2023 legislative session. Schools in Marion and Brevard Counties and P.K. Yonge Developmental Research School in Gainesville were also approved.
The district says in addition to Rawlings, Wyomina Park Elementary in Marion County and Challenger 7 Elementary in Brevard County will also be switching to a year-round calendar for the upcoming school year. But according to the district, P.K. Yonge says the earliest it would consider implementing a year-round format would be in the 2025-26 school year. Marion County’s Wyomina Park Elementary will begin classes on July 22.