Cleveland May Drop Year-Round Schedule

Cleveland Elementary moved one step closer to transitioning from a year-round calendar to a traditional school year as Santa Barbara Unified School District’s Board of Education voted unanimously on 1/10 to open discussions with the teachers union. The majority of polled parents are already on board, with families citing work- and vacation-related conflicts associated with the year-around schedule, especially when those families have other children attending schools on a traditional schedule. Principal Gabriel Sandoval also spoke in favor of a traditional calendar.

Since year-round teachers are used to getting a paycheck 12 months out of the year, the district and the union will be discussing a “deferred net pay” system that skims a bit from the traditional year’s 10 monthly checks to be paid out in July and August.

Since becoming a year-round school in 1998, when it had 600 students and was high-achieving, Cleveland’s enrollment has steadily dropped, in large part, the data suggests, because families were having trouble adapting to the calendar. Today, Cleveland holds 347 students and has one of the highest absentee rates among the district’s 13 elementary schools.