Whenever her daughter's year-round school has been on break, her two sons' high school has been in session -- or vice versa. Now, Atherton is among more than 1,700 Wake County parents who have filed for a chance at a seat at a traditional-calendar school.

"There's always someone in school," Atherton said. "The family never gets time off."

Wake will take applications for magnet, year-round and traditional-calendar schools through Friday evening.

The demand for traditional-calendar seats this year may exceed last year's total. As of Monday, Wake had received 1,736 applications for traditional-calendar schools. School officials say the number could be distorted by people submitting multiple applications.

Last year, Wake received 1,519 applications for traditional-calendar slots. All the applicants, some of whom also applied for magnet schools, were given slots.

But Chuck Dulaney, assistant superintendent for growth and planning, said it is too soon to say whether everyone who wants a traditional-calendar seat can be accommodated this year.

As a way to keep up with growth, Wake created the system for families to leave year-round schools when it converted 22 schools to that calendar last year. Families who wanted to return to traditional-calendar schools had to apply, but school officials could turn them down.

Wake County Superior Court Judge Howard E. Manning Jr. ruled in May that making the application available to parents wasn't enough. Wake agreed to send consent forms to all families assigned to year-round schools. That put more power in the hands of parents.

School officials are appealing Manning's ruling and are delaying sending the consent forms until April. For now, they're only using the application process.

Most parents did keep their children at year-round schools, but some are having second thoughts.

"We tried year-round but we don't like it," said Karen Stevens of North Raleigh, who applied to return her two children to traditional-calendar schools.

Michelle Lombana said she wants to leave because the staff at Salem Middle School has a tough time offering elective courses on the year-round calendar. She said the foreign language teacher can't efficiently teach to a large group because students in different tracks are at different points in the lesson plan. The students are constantly coming to and from breaks in their schedules, so the teacher must work with small groups of students.

"Salem Middle is doing the best they possibly can," said Lombana, a Cary resident. "But I just don't think that year-round lends itself to middle school."

Other parents said they would leave year-round schools if they could but complain that the options offered aren't palatable.

Millie Hotard won't apply because the traditional-calendar choice for her child's Knightdale school is in Zebulon.

"Nowhere else do they make you go to a school two towns over for a traditional calendar," Hotard said.

School leaders admit they don't want to make the traditional-calendar options too appealing.

But other parents say they're happy with the year-round calendar and have no desire to leave.

The year-round calendar, with its frequent short breaks, has been so good for Kelly Vandermel that her family will take a Caribbean cruise next month at a much lower price than they would pay in the summer.

"I thought it would be difficult giving up the summer," said Vandermel, whose daughters' North Raleigh school was converted. "They made the adjustment very easily."