Can Wake protect 2028 spring break for teachers? Will it impact Thanksgiving?
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Board directed committee to return options to protect teachers' spring break.
- Suggested options: swap Nov. 24 with March 27 or move April 17 teacher workday to April 3.
- Board directed committee to bring back three calendar options.
Teachers at Wake County’s traditional-calendar schools could have a shorter guaranteed Thanksgiving break as a way to provide them a full week off during spring break in 2028.
School administrators on Tuesday presented a draft 2027-28 calendar for traditional-calendar schools that could result in some teachers having to work on the first day of spring break for students. Now the school board will consider different options to change the calendar to try to give teachers that full spring break week off.
Most of Wake County’s 160,000 students and 10,000+ teachers are in the district’s traditional-calendar schools.
Wake complying with school calendar law
A calendar committee consisting of teachers, parents, school administrators and community members recommended a calendar for traditional-calendar schools for the 2027-28 school year that runs from Aug. 23 to June 8.
The proposal complies with North Carolina’s school calendar law, which says traditional-calendar schools can’t open earlier than the Monday closest to Aug. 26 or end later than the Friday closest to June 11.
“The calendar law has blocked us into these dates so it’s never going to be perfect,” Superintendent Robert Taylor told the board on Tuesday.
Wake isn’t among the 25% of North Carolina school districts that have chosen to defy the calendar law.
Could teachers not get full week for spring break?
Much of the discussion Tuesday was over the spring break scheduled for March 27-31, 2028.
March 27, a Monday, is listed as a teacher workday. Principals may require teachers to work March 27 in order to enter student grades for report cards for the third quarter, which ends March 24.
“It puts them in the position where they can’t have the vacation week with their families,” said school board member Cheryl Caulfield.
Caulfield suggested looking at the days scheduled for Thanksgiving break in 2027. Schools will be closed Nov. 24-26.
Caulfield suggested swapping the March 27 teacher workday with a vacation day scheduled for Nov. 24, the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. If the change is made, individual schools would have to decide whether to require teachers to work Nov. 24.
“Teachers are accustomed to having an actual vacation day on the Wednesday before so they don’t have to choose,” said Tamani Anderson Powell, the school administrator who works with the calendar committee.
Wake will consider different calendar options
Anderson Powell had an alternative proposal on Tuesday. She suggested moving a teacher workday proposed for April 17 to April 3. Anderson Powell said principals might not require teachers to work on March 27 because they could do their end-of-quarter work on April 3.
“There’s another workday when they come back that could be required by the school for the end of quarter work that they must do,” Anderson Powell said.
The board directed the calendar committee to bring back three options: the original proposal, a calendar with the change suggested by Caulfield and a calendar with the change suggested by Anderson Powell.
School board vice chair Sam Hershey said he’s concerned that the calendar has too many weeks where there aren’t five days of classes.
“That puts a lot of stress on families that have to find child care, whether it’s one parent or two parents,” Hershey said.
