Loudoun County schools’ early start highlights debate over Virginia law

Starting early means schools close earlier in June. Julie West, a mother of two Loudoun students, welcomed that change, saying the weeks after standardized tests are usually light on academics anyway.

“It’s really all about partying at the end of the year,” West said. “The brains have shut down.”

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Standardized tests have helped make an early start attractive to school leaders.

Besides Loudoun, 76 other school systems — more than half the 132 statewide — were granted waivers this year, many of them in mountainous areas. Fauquier, Clarke and Rappahannock counties, on the rural fringes of the Washington region, qualified for snow-day waivers and started school last week.

Elsewhere in Northern Virginia, one school in Arlington County and two in Alexandria are allowed to start early this year under a provision in the law granting waivers for “innovative and experimental” programs.

Arlington and Fairfax County officials said they want full power to choose when schools open. “All we’re asking for is flexibility,” said Fairfax schools spokesman Paul Regnier. “We’re not saying when we would start.”

Many parents are also willing to consider a shift. In January, a Fairfax schools survey of more than 10,600 parents founds that 64 percent favored starting classes one week earlier. Seventy-one percent of more than 12,500 Fairfax teachers agreed.

In Richmond this year, lawmakers introduced at least five bills to return more control over start dates to school boards. None were voted out of subcommittee, but Del. Kaye Kory (D-Fairfax), who sponsored one of the failed measures, said the “unprecedented” interest in overturning the Labor Day law represents the “beginning of what will ultimately be a groundswell” of support.

Kory and Dels. James M. LeMunyon (R-Fairfax) and Thomas A. “Tag” Greason (R-Loudoun) said they would renew efforts to change the school-calendar law next year.

“Why is Richmond telling each of the localities when they can or can’t start school? To me, that should be a local decision,” Greason said. “The localities should know better what the requirements are of their citizens, and one size doesn’t normally fit all.”