Comment Re:No, school should not be year-round. (Score 1) 421
Hrm. That was never my experience. When I was teaching, I took the time off. I generally spent the first week gearing down, and the last month prepping, but took most of the time off or took classes. Most of my colleagues either did the same, though a few continued to work for the district teaching remedial classes over the summer, substituting, or tutoring. I don't know of anyone who waited tables or cleaned houseboats, though perhaps the low cost of living in Nevada is part of that? I also know that the year round schools never have difficulty filling positions with very well qualified teachers---even in low income areas---as there are a large number of people wanting to take those jobs. Traditional schools generally have greater difficulty. Of course, this may be symptomatic of there being a relatively small number of year round schools in the district and a somewhat larger, though stilly minority, population of teachers with a marked preference.
Of course, we can trade anecdotes 'til the cows come home---do you have any data, one way or the other? I can find a number of opinion pieces, but my google-fu is turning up nothing in terms of surveys of teachers and their preferences (this article is about the best that I can find and it is both out of date and answering a slightly different set of questions, though it seems to come down on the side of teachers in that particular district having a preference for year round schools). Have you had any better luck?
I would also note (again) that the issue of teacher compensation appears to be tangential to the issue of year round schooling. A year round schedule may exacerbate the problem, but the problem is inadequate compensation rather than the calendar cycle.