RALEIGH - A judge Wednesday questioned the Wake County school system's legal authority to require students to attend schools that follow a year-round calendar.

Superior Court Judge Howard Manning Jr. said during a hearing that he hadn't found anything in state law allowing mandatory year-round schools. He also questioned the fairness of making 20,000 students attend the 22 schools that Wake plans to convert to a year-round schedule this summer.

"Can you assign these children without their parents having much input other than to say, 'We don't like it, and we don't want to change?' " Manning said during a hearing in which he spent far more time questioning the school system's arguments than those made by parents trying to stop the calendar change.

But he didn't rule on a request from Wake CARES to issue an injunction blocking the conversions. He also didn't rule on the school system's request to dismiss Wake CARES' lawsuit challenging the year-round plan.

Manning didn't indicate when he will rule, but both the school system and Wake CARES hope for a decision soon.

This is the latest round in the battle over whether mandatory year-round schools are the best way to deal with rapid growth in Wake County.

The founders of Wake CARES said they were glad to have their concerns heard.

"I feel optimistic that Judge Manning is listening to the details of both sides of the argument," said parent Dawn Graff. "I feel positive that we have heightened the awareness of the issue."

School officials said people shouldn't read too much into the level of questioning Manning gave to the school district's arguments.

"He asked hard questions, as he should," said Wake Superintendent Del Burns.

School leaders say they need to convert the schools to year-round schedules to help accommodate 8,000 additional students expected this fall. The year-round calendar can handle more students than traditional schools because buildings are in constant use with four staggered schedules, or tracks.

Ann Majestic, the school board's attorney, said the district turned to the conversions as a last resort when it had to reduce the amount of last fall's construction bond issue to a small enough amount to make it acceptable to voters. She cited a state law which exempts year-round schools from having to start no earlier than Aug. 25 as Wake's legal authority for the conversions.

"It's not because the school board has wanted to willy-nilly create year-round schools," Majestic said. "It's because the county is so popular that we've got kids coming in droves."

Parents' points

Wake CARES contends that requiring only some students to attend year-round schools violates the state Constitution's guarantee of a "uniform system" of schools with "equal opportunities" for all students.

The parents' group has said conversion would limit extracurricular activities for students and tear families apart by putting siblings on different schedules.

The conversions would put more than a third of Wake's elementary schools on a year-round calendar, with the suburban areas such as Apex bearing much of the load. It was pointed out that elementary schools inside I-440 will stay on the traditional calendar.

"We're asking to be treated the same way as people are being treated inside the Beltline, who are assigned to traditional-calendar schools," said Robert Hunter, an attorney for Wake CARES.

Hunter said suburban parents shouldn't have to suffer because the school board didn't ask for enough money to avoid the conversions. He said the board should have asked county commissioners for the money and taken legal action if the money wasn't forthcoming.

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