I would love to start school on Aug. 1. Not because I can't wait for summer to be over, but because I would love to finish the semester at Thanksgiving. Being home all holiday season would have many benefits that I would take full advantage of. Although, I trust that our schedule has been planned with good reason. In fact, most other schools in Virginia follow a similar calendar. I am sure there are many positive factors that contribute to the calendar the way it is.
I have experienced four Thanksgiving breaks. I am hardly the authority on calendar planning, but as a student, I have had to deal with the somewhat minor complications that have arose by having a week of classes and finals following Thanksgiving break. Now, these complaints are minor, and I acknowledge that my concerns are not ones that need to be met with immediate action. The purpose of this editorial is to encourage conversations and a new light to consider when planning future calendars for academic years.
The first issue that arises is I have hardly any time to spend with my family over Thanksgiving break. The holidays are meant to be a time to spend with the ones you love, but instead I find myself having quality bonding time with my laptop, notes and textbooks. This past weekend my family went to Williamsburg, Va. I rode down with my brother, but instead of enjoying the rare time I had with him, I found myself reading a book for class instead. I was very disappointed to not be able to spend that time with him, but because my laptop would die before we even made it out of my town and I had a desperate need to utilize the four hours to get work done, I ended up ignoring him the whole way.
All my other free time was spent doing work as well. This is not to bash professors; of course they need to assign work to be due at the end of the semester. Over this break, only one professor actually had something that had to be done, and it was the class' choice to not move the due date. Everything else was due this last week of classes. I maintain a steady flow of work during the weeks of the semester, though, and in order to stay on track as the end nears I need to utilize those five days to get some dents in on the workload. It would just be nice to turn in all my papers, take all my tests and leave the workload behind when I go to spend time with my family.
The second issue that arises is that it becomes increasingly difficult to obtain some sort of winter job. I worked with Longwood Conferences and Scheduling this past summer, and while I absolutely loved my job, the one unfortunate part is it does not leave me anywhere to return to for winter break. As I started to search for seasonal jobs, I found that a lot of them had a start date of Dec. 1 at the latest. I am from northern Virginia, where there is a decent amount of students my age who go to community college and therefore are in town for the entire holiday season. Outside of that percentage, there are many adults looking to pick the extra holiday shifts.
You have one student who, although he does have a class schedule, he has flexibility to work every day from Black Friday up to Christmas Eve. You have an adult who has no prior commitments and can work any shift at anytime. Then you have me who can work Black Friday, but then I split town for two weeks and come back on Dec. 11. Who would want to hire someone who can work two days in November and 13 days in December, when you can find someone else to work 30 days total? As I quickly found out, no one wanted my incredibly limited services.
For those who have looked into jobs in Farmville, that too can be frustrating. I recently scored an on campus job that I am very thankful for, but up until now, finding on campus opportunities have been difficult. Looking in town has been nearly impossible. I applied for numerous jobs that all led to dead ends, the most common reason being cited is that my schedule was too difficult to work with. Five glorious weeks off from classes to try to make as much savings as possible, and yet my five weeks begins after the start date for most of the businesses in my hometown.
The third issue is how expensive it can be to travel. I live 200 miles away. I get fairly good gas mileage and still use a considerable amount of gas to get to and from school. I cannot imagine how much it costs someone with poor gas mileage to get home. Driving home the Tuesday of Thanksgiving week, driving back to school on that Sunday and then driving back home 10 days later can be costly. As stated above, I struggle to get any sort of job. Not drawing a paycheck over Thanksgiving can make it difficult for me to get back into town and out again.
Starting earlier could have a positive effect in the spring semester as well. If fall semester ended in mid-Thanksgiving, the spring semester could start in early January. We could end a little earlier in April and have graduation earlier. This would allow Longwood and Hampden-Sydney to have different graduation dates. That would prove to be convenient for those Longwood students who would like to attend the Hampden-Sydney graduation and vice versa. It would also lighten the load significantly on the town of Farmville.
I enjoy my summer days, but I would enjoy the benefits that would come with an alteration in the calendar even more. Building up my savings count and spending quality time with my family are two large goals that could be more easily achieved by ending the semester in November.
