The unthinkable is happening. Philadelphia school kids are going to start attending school year-round according to Tom MacDonald at WHYY.org:

Year-round school for Philadelphia students will soon have a trial run.

Speaking at a City Council budget hearing this week, Superintendent Tony Watlington said the district is working on a model to fulfill Mayor Cherelle Parker‘s goal to stop the “summer slide,” where students disengage from learning between academics years and material has to be retaught.

“We are meeting regularly with the mayor’s team to stand up 20 school pilots for the 2024-2025 school year,” Watlington said.

The 20 test schools will not be completely year-round in the pilot’s first year, but will have extended day classes.

“For year one, we are looking to expand before and after school and to layer on some enriching activities,” he said. Enriched reading, as well as math and science classes featuring robotics, will be included.

Now how the hell is the city going to do year-long schooling when Jalen Hurts has to donate $200k worth of air conditioning? Beats me. But I’m all for keeping the kids in school all year long because, in one of the poorest cities in the country, it’s how most get fed and keeps them safe.

And it’s not like they’ll be going more than they already are:

For the school year starting in the fall of 2025, the calendar will be extended beyond the traditional dates for the 20 pilot schools.

“Where they actually start school before the other schools in the district, and we eliminate the long break in the summer, but they’ll get breaks during the year,” he said. “So they won’t go to school 365 days or 300 days a year. They’ll have holidays and they’ll have small breaks built in.”

Currently Japan does year-long schooling and they have the highest average IQ in the world. But if Mayor Parker wants to build an army of baby geniuses she’s got to sell this in a way we can understand. Are these mini-cyborgs going to be a feeder program to the Eagles, Phillies, Flyers, and Sixers? I want to know how the best and brightest are going to help this city win more championships. Because if Howie Roseman is plucking 6th graders out of Frank Rizzo Elementary to build software programs where he can’t miss on a draft pick I say why stop at 230 days? Lets make it 300!

Who knows where we’d all be if we went to school year-round. I probably wouldn’t be yelling at strangers on the street and making stupid videos I’ll tell you that. Every year summer wiped the hard drive. Best season in the universe and it’s not even close. But when I went back to school after taking three months off I was a smooth brain. I had a cerebrum full of 7/11 Slurpees and spent the last three months memorizing the Eagles playbook in Madden. I didn’t have room for whatever the hell a quadratic equation is.