• 2023-2024 ACADEMIC CALENDAR INFORMATION

    The York School District One Board of Trustees voted at their regularly scheduled meeting on January 10, 2023 to adopt a Modified Balanced Calendar for the 2023-2024 school year. While this is a shift from the traditional calendar, district officials are intrigued by the numerous benefits associated with implementing this type of calendar.

    “While this will be a mindset shift and adjustment for our community, this calendar provides us with an option that we have not had before. We will have the chance to intervene with kids falling behind early, hopefully lessening the need for students to spend their summer catching up in summer school. We are also excited about the potential to offer enrichment experiences for students during intercession weeks. This aligns well with our Strategic Change Agenda, which is focused on student readiness and helping students find the intersection between their academic strengths and individual talents and passions,” said Kelly Coxe, Superintendent of York School District One.

    Prior to the adoption of the Modified Balanced Calendar, district officials communicated with several South Carolina school districts who have already implemented this kind of calendar for the 2022-2023 school year or are considering doing so next school year. Those districts cited benefits that come with the adoption of a Modified Balanced Calendar but are not available under the traditional calendar. The impact of COVID-19 on student learning and the looming teacher shortage presents a unique opportunity for districts to utilize new and innovative approaches to support learning recovery efforts and attract and retain teachers. While a Modified Balanced Calendar does not add any additional days for students or teachers, it does create opportunities for students to recover learning in a timelier fashion and allows teachers to recharge throughout the school year rather than working long stretches between traditional breaks in December and April.

    In addition to early intervention and enrichment opportunities, creating a calendar with an equal number of instructional days each semester also has merit. Secondary students who participate in semester-long courses can be guaranteed the same number of instructional days regardless of the semester in which they take the course. That has not been true under the traditional calendar. For example, the fall semester of the 2022-2023 school year is 87 days, while the spring semester is 93 days. This means that students who take a semester-long course in the spring receive 6 more days of instruction than their fall semester counterparts. The modified balanced calendar remedies that inequity, with 90 instructional days included in both the fall and spring semesters.

    While the summer break will be two weeks shorter than that of a traditional calendar, those two weeks are not lost.  Instead, teachers and students will have those weeks as breaks during October and February, which are highlighted as intercession on the approved calendar.

    With the approval of the modified balanced calendar for the 2023-2024 school year, District officials are excited to monitor the impact on students and teachers, hoping to see a decreased need for summer remediation and an increase in teacher retention. For additional information, please review our full press release and other links below.

    2023-2024 District Calendar
    Printable Version  |  Approved January 10, 2023

    PRESS RELEASE
    NEWS ARTICLE