Parents are rightly furious over the city public-school calendar for the school year starting this fall \u2014 but the insanely late start date of Sept. 10 is the least of it: This is yet another blaring signal that the adults running New York\u2019s public-school system don\u2019t much care if the kids learn.<\/p>\n
Yes, lots of teachers and many school leaders do care, but they have to fight the system, including the United Federation of Teachers, to do right by students. <\/p>\n
After the Department of Education released the calendar Tuesday, initial parent anger<\/a> focused on the late start and even later finish (June 28!) as well as long breaks and erratic closures that complicate child-care arrangements.<\/p>\n For the late start, blame the UFT contract, which maximizes its members\u2019 beach time by mandating that classes resume on the Thursday after Labor Day (Sept. 7 this year), with teachers getting the Tuesday and Wednesday to prepare their classrooms for the year. <\/p>\n Note that Mayor Mike Bloomberg\u2019 schools chancellor, Joel Klein, struck a deal with the United Federation of Teachers to get teachers back before Labor Day for prep days; sadly his successors haven\u2019t bothered.<\/p>\n More: About 60% of city public charter schools \u2014 run by folks who do care about education \u2014 open in mid-to-late August, reports the NYC Charter School Center, \u201coffering additional instructional time as students catch up from summer break.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\tMore From\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPost Editorial Board<\/p>\n No wonder more families keep opting out of traditional public schools and into charters. <\/p>\n Charters also tend to offer more instructional days than the state-mandated 180 \u2014 whereas DOE schools will only provide at most 177 in 2026-\u201927.<\/p>\n How\u2019s that? Well, the people in charge at the State Education Department also aren\u2019t over-concerned with learning, so they count the days when kids take state exams (English and math assessments in grades 3-8, Regents exams in high school) as \u201cinstructional\u201d \u2014 and up to four \u201cteacher development\u201d days, too.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\tGet opinions and commentary from our columnists\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSubscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter!\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\tThanks for signing up!\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n In a school system where more than 40% of city kids in grades 3-8 failed state math and English assessments, not making more instructional time the top priority is a disgrace.\u00a0<\/p>\n Heck, new schools Chancellor Kamar Samuels couldn\u2019t even keep his promise to include parents in calendar planning, though hundreds of them serve on a host of local and citywide \u201ceducation councils\u201d in an elaborate show (facade, really) of \u201cparental involvement.\u201d<\/p>\n The adults running these schools can\u2019t even face the crisis of chronic absenteeism; the DOE won\u2019t even let teachers flunk kids<\/a> who never come to class.<\/p>\n Somehow, the drive for \u201cequity\u201d in DOE schools leaves ever-fewer poor, minority kids excelling \u2014 for real success, such families have to find a good charter. <\/p>\n Rather than focus on more time in class, the equity crowd obsesses about smaller class sizes and ever-higher spending in the name of education \u2014 \u201csolutions\u201d that mainly just fill the coffers of the UFT.<\/p>\n