It sits quietly, waiting, an empty shell.
This is an important place.
Young minds are molded into being here.
Curiosity, ideas, the rich history of man, the leaf, the poem, the work, and the art.
Here they are nurtured and carried away by each child.
Yet this room and almost two million instructional rooms like it are closed for three -fourths of each school day and for the summer months each year.
And along with the classrooms, over 50 ,000 libraries, 25 ,000 auditoriums, 40 ,000 cafeterias, 30 ,000 gymnasiums, thousands of buses, laboratories, audiovisual tools, shops, and special purpose facilities sit and wait.
This $84 billion school plant sits idle for one -third of the school year, while the U .S.
government school spending program in the early 70s accelerated at $5 ,000 per second, $300 ,000 per hour, $1 ,800 ,000 per day.
As of this moment, we have 46 million students in school.
300 ,000 are on half -day sessions because of crowded facilities.
Without building one new school, a plan conceived in the early 1900s, tested and in use in many areas of our country, would allow immediate expansion for 15 million students, create a new environment for better education, uncrowded facilities, and the last chance to save our overburdened, tradition -ridden educational system.
It's all so simple.
It's the year -round school.
Scorned by many, understood by few, the year -round school has been tried for many years.
In a number of school districts throughout the country, it is in full swing today.
In others, it was talked about, researched, reported on, reviewed, and all too often, trampled.
We recently asked Senator Percy, senior senator from Illinois, about his views on the year -round school.
I think there's a basic concept that has to be gotten to.
We must essentially look at ourselves as a nation organized today as the most modern and industrial society on earth, but still clinging to the past, still organized as an agricultural society in some respects.
For instance, we organized our school year based on the fact that 90 % of the population were farmers.
They needed the boys back home to harvest the crops.
So schools operated nine months a year so that the young men and women could be back on the farm harvesting, helping their parents bring the farm crops in.
We are now a nation 5 % engaged in agriculture, 95 % in other pursuits, but all of our school year is based on the organization structure set up for an agricultural rural nation.
I'm very happy to say that right in my own state of Illinois, the Valley View School District 96, located just 35 miles southwest of Chicago, has had this experiment.
Necessity was the mother of invention.
They had a population explosion.
They had reached the end of their debt limit.
They couldn't raise taxes anymore, and yet they had 7 ,000 students crowded into a space only available, built for 5 ,500.
What would they do? They then went to what they call the 45 -15 plan.
This enabled the students to have a regular schedule.
They geographically organized it so that it never had a different schedule for brothers and sisters, so that vacations could be planned.
And I think really you should ask the children, the teachers, the school board members, all of the community how they like it.
This isn't theory.
This has actually been tried in a community that's typical of many communities across the country.
They have, as Lincoln said, thought anew and acted anew about an old problem.
That old problem plagued the Valley View School District for quite a while.
Options were few, and the students and parents felt the growing need.
So did the administrators and teachers.
Back in the year 1968, Valley View found itself in rather a unique position in that we needed a third more space in our schools, but we had the inability to go and borrow the money for these buildings.
The Board of Education had three alternatives to take a look at.
Half -day sessions, 60 -70 in the classroom, a rescheduled school year.
The people of the community said no to half -day sessions.
Of course, teachers said no to 60 or 70 in the classroom.
Thus, after about a month of research, the 45 -15 plan was born.
In the beginning, we did a lot of public relations with our community, explaining what our problem was and our plans for solving that problem, which was our particular form of year -round school that we devised.
And I think it should be understood that in a community who thinks enough of their children to pass 21 straight tax rate increases for their children's benefit, that to say the least, they had a good deal of trust in our educational program and our school system.
And I think probably, if I might use the word worst, reaction we had was by and large, well, they haven't hurt us in the past.
They have performed for us.
I may not like it.
I may not quite understand it.
But let's let them go and see what evolves.
And I would guess from that time until today that probably we have more than doubled the approval of community reaction to the program.
I would even go so far as to say I doubt whether we could take it away from the community.
These children are in a Valley View year -round school.
They attend school for 45 days and are on leave for 15 school days.
They also have all normal holidays.
They alternate their time off so that one -fourth of the students are always on holiday for 15 days.
When they return, another fourth of the students go, and so on.
Alternate year -round school plans exist, and special community needs may dictate one or another.
45 -15 is the system most commonly used.
Students on 45 -15 can have smaller classes.
They can also have special training.
They can continue in their chosen sports activity.
And they can start their schooling when they are old enough, at any of four times a year, rather than only once in the fall.
Teachers respond to 45 -15 for many reasons.
I think the students enjoy being on 45 -15 because it's a change in their year.
They know that every 45 days they'll have 15 days off, and they enjoy the break.
When they come back to school, we find that they're much more eager to get started again.
I think for the teachers who are on the 45 -15 plan, there are also benefits.
They can use those 15 days to plan, to develop new activities and develop materials.
And I really feel that the 45 -15 plan has promoted individualization within the district.
Since you have a quarter of your student population coming and going constantly, you must individualize.
And the trends in education today are toward individualization.
I would think that year -round schools would do a great deal, not only to hold down property taxes, to hold down cost.
With skyrocketing construction cost, it's almost a horror for a school district to realize that the increasing population pouring into the community, being built in the community, is going to require more school buildings at the extraordinarily high cost that we now have.
A year -round school would enable us to have smaller classes and enable us to put more money into operating our schools rather than in just bricks and mortar, which contribute relatively little to the child's education.
But the cost of bricks, the mortar, the books, and the teaching equipment continue to plague administrators everywhere.
Year -round schools solve many more problems than they create.
Even special needs are not forgotten, because costs can be reduced.
The school building you see behind me is one of four senior high schools presently under construction.
Prince William County has undertaken a rather extensive construction program, and this is one school which will be on the year -round school program very shortly.
Presently in Prince William County, we have a 45 -15 program, which is a mandatory attendance program.
The school board has recently approved the implementation of year -round schools division -wide.
One of the reasons was the fantastic cost problem with respect to construction of new schools.
Comparing the year -round school construction cost to the conventional school construction cost will save $40 million between now and 1980.
The analysis of costs between 1959 and 1980, where Prince William County public schools would have been on year -round, would have produced a $90 million savings in approximately a 20 -year period of time.
An extensive analysis of operational costs in the year -round schools compared to conventional schools indicated a 9 .6 % saving on the middle school level.
The saving breakdown was 4 .9 % in the personnel area and 4 .7 % in the facility and equipment area.
If we were looking at the actual cost benefit to a division and we use the 9 .6 as a base, in the Godwin Middle School in Prince William County, we saved $109 .46 per child per year under year -round school compared to the conventional program.
It has been said that the year -round school program could be more easily adopted if the vacation problem were eliminated.
Vacations and summertime seem ideally suited.
It is amazing how universal that thought seems to be.
But why do we all have to compete for the same simple pleasures in the same places at the same time? In year -round school, only one -fourth of the students are on holiday at one time.
They have their vacations four times a year, three weeks at a time, plus all regular holidays too.
They can visit the local zoo or travel to Europe or Mexico.
They can ski in the winter, go sailing in the spring, fishing and camping in the late fall.
Where in the world can they go? Anywhere.
What can they do? Anything.
Especially when only one -fourth of them want to do it at the same time.
Year -round school exists in many parts of the country, sometimes on a permanent basis, often on a trial basis.
The San Diego schools are into a 45 -15 program of some magnitude.
We went into this plan because we're experiencing in our city tremendous growth in the outskirts of the city, in the suburban areas.
And we have not been able, under California law, to get an approved bond issue with a required two -thirds vote.
So we faced the problem.
If we're going to house youngsters, we're either going to have to transport them to schools in the central part of the city where we do have some capacity.
Or we're going to have to go on double sessions, or we're going to have to pass a bond issue, or we'll go on another system for better utilization of the facilities we have.
Our 45 -15 plan in six schools saved us the equivalent of having to build a new elementary school because we can house approximately 10 to 15 percent more in the same facilities by having a staggered shift of youngsters.
We've been now in the 45 -15 plan for about eight months.
Our experience has been pretty positive.
Now in terms of student achievement, we feel at this time, however, with the preliminary results that students are achieving as well, or maybe a little better, than under the traditional program.
Student absenteeism is down as much as 25 percent in several schools.
The absentee rate of teachers has gone down considerably, and maybe that's because of the fact that you do have a period to get some rest and rehabilitation.
I'm a parent of two children enrolled here at Curie School.
I'm also serve as chairman of a Citizens Advisory Committee, which is a committee set up by our school district to help further communication between the community and the schools.
I personally have found it very beneficial for my children.
We feel that the continuity is much better.
Right now I'm involved in helping with an intersession program, which is a miniature summer school program.
In essence, it's the time the children who are off for a three -week period choose to come back and take extracurricular activity in the form of an intersession.
And it's amazing to me, these children have been in school for nine weeks, and you think they'd want to be home watching television or making mud pies, but they're in foods.
They're back in the classroom at 8 .30 this morning, raring to go, and they're not doing just all art projects.
They're doing their math and their phonics and their regular educational program.
What are the real benefits in year -round schools for the teacher? Extra wages? Retirement benefits? More.
It's also the contact with eager, curious young minds, searching, finding, learning.
The arena of the school room where the student and the teacher meet in work is always the final moment of truth for the school system.
I can recall so vividly as a teacher coming out after having worked so hard for the degree and so on, and you put in your nine months of teaching, and then all of a sudden there you were confronted.
With a three -month layoff.
Financially you couldn't afford it, especially if you were married and had family obligations.
And so you had to go out and you had to take any type of work that you could possibly take in order to bring in the necessary finances for you to live through the summer.
And well I can remember for one summer I worked at the sanitary district and used to clean the rakes that used to go down and drudge the river.
Another summer I sold sporting goods, worked out on construction crews.
And it was a very frustrating thing because of course I wanted to be working at the thing that I was trained for, at my profession.
The children can hardly wait to come back, but I do find something I was afraid of hasn't really happened.
I was afraid that before a vacation we would lose a lot of teaching time by the children getting too excited like they usually do.
Every day I am so glad to see those children come to school.
And every day they are so glad to come.
We are just tickled to see each other.
And on regular school we do get periods where both the children and myself do get pretty tired.
And we don't have that on year -round school.
We are always glad to be here.
In taking a look at our present salary schedule at Valley View, we decided to divide the traditional 180 -day contract into the salary schedule to come up with a per diem pay rate.
Now you know for a number of years teachers have been bemoaning the fact that they need a salary to live for a full year.
By paying on a per diem rate at Valley View, we afford teachers the opportunity to work more than 180 days.
The maximum contract is 240 days.
At Valley View we have over 50 % of our staff choosing to work more than 180 days.
I don't think any other profession could stand to let their professional staff go for three months during the summer.
What would the hospitals do? What about the dentists? What if your attorneys were not available to give you counsel for three months during the summer? Personally I feel it's a waste of talent.
At Valley View today, the professional staff in our district who chooses to work a full year can start out at $12 ,000.
Meaning a bachelor's degree and no experience.
The top of our salary schedule for full year work is right almost at $26 ,000.
Now I ask the question, are we now competing with business and industry? My only regret is that 45 -15 didn't start about 30 or 40 years ago.
An overwhelming percentage of the students on year -round school enjoy it.
They can enjoy the freedom of this new approach for many reasons.
Along with the many advantages, service groups like YMCA, the Boys Clubs of America, Junior Achievement could also lighten their peak summer loads and develop programs all year round.
The question still kept arising, what about jobs for kids during the summer? Quite truthfully, we knew that there weren't jobs for all of the high school students in the summer in the past.
We actually have gone into the employment business.
We have an individual that serves as a representative between our Board of Education and local business and industry.
We have worked with people in the community and today I can say that our employment rate has increased drastically due to 45 -15.
Now students can work 15 days when they're out of school.
An employer who has a full -time job opening, it can now be served by four students on each track.
It was only a few months ago that we received a report from our so -called employment agency that we had more jobs available for students in Valley View than what we had students willing to work at.
The need for part -time employment by many students is both urgent and a growing requirement.
The dignity of a part -time job should be shared by all.
And the rejections increase as employers are pressed by an abundance of summer applicants.
Seasonal needs by many industries call for year -round employment of young people who are needed, who need the work, who need the training and the lift of being accepted.
Certainly, higher education for instance, the President has said no child should lack for a higher education because of financial necessities or needs.
I worry a great deal about what happens to the cities in the summer.
We all worry.
We've seen them up in flames.
A great deal of that dissatisfaction in Chicago and the streets of East St.
Louis when we have particularly minority young people out of work and idle in the hot summer.
It's the idleness that causes trouble, the feeling that they're not needed or wanted.
They can't get a job.
Where suddenly in our private sector or public sector do we provide jobs for 16 million students all at once? But we could provide jobs for several million periodically four times a year and have teams of people available to go tandem on a job and off a job as they go back into school.
This would help us and it would save us millions of dollars of tax money for jobs we make and create just to provide activity for the summer.
Let's think about it.
Let's not just try to drown this problem in dollars and pour money in on it.
Let's use our heads.
Change our habits a little bit.
We may find that the change of habit has enriched our lives, reduced our cost and made the quality of life a great deal better in America for students, for parents and for teachers.
From the beginning, schools closed for the summer.
Students dropped their learning, their school books, pencils and scratchy pens to work in the fields.
The summer period was not a vacation.
It was the time to work, sow, reap, to help the family harvest the grain, fatten the calf.
Our children today have new, unplowed fields to furrow, to plant, new flowers to grow.
These are the fields of the new sciences, the intense new arts, the skills of technicians, deep concerns with the atom, the moon, the universe and with blood chemistry, with communication, with the computer, with light and sound.
The educational structure must be geared to meet the future now.
Year -round schools make such good sense.
Why waste time? Ars longa, vita vivus.
Art is long, but life is short.
