No More Year Round!!

Ty's school called today with a voice recording warning parents that an important note was coming home today. This happens quite often and it is never anything to make me go wow until today. Today's note said because of the economy they could no longer afford to keep our school open year round and starting in August '09 we are officially back on a traditional schedule.

WHAT!!! I can not even begin to tell you my reaction. First I had to pick my jaw up off the floor then I called Matt and told him. Our principal has been telling us for years that with all the growth in our area there is just no way we could go back on a traditional schedule. In fact at the beginning of this year we were told because of the new boundaries we were "over staffed" and would be losing teachers next year.

Let me explain our school to you. First of all I love our school, principal and staff. Love, love, love them. And yes year round was okay until Zack went to Jr. High. (We have had quite a challenging year with two different school schedules!) Seven years ago when we first moved in Zack started kindergarten. We were on a traditional schedule, we had portables and our school was just completing a 10 room addition. By first grade the addition was complete and we still had portables. By second grade we had lots of portables and by third we were year round and still had portables. Our elementary has been the largest in the district for years. Since going year round a new elementary was built and the boundaries have been redone two different times. This year alone we have over 1,100 students, we are year round, we have portables and we bus kids past our school to another elementary. Yes this topic has been Hot!!

Our school is the only one in the area that is on year round so everything in the community is scheduled around the traditional schedule. The city recreation department tries to accommodate everyone, but year round kids miss out on a lot of activities.

Before the note, Matt and I were discussing once again, a way to get Ty into a traditional school. We even talked about moving but neither of us want to do that. I can not believe something this miraculous (yes it is a miracle) has come out of a bad economy!

Wow, I still can not believe it!