School absence rates are high in December, with holiday traveling, out-of-state sports competitions and cold and flu season, causing teachers to avoid any new instruction they’ll end up having to reteach. Cue the holiday crafts, movies and class parties.

To address the problem, Salt Lake Academy, a Herriman charter school, tackled it head-on by extending winter break from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day.

“We had tracked attendance for a couple years between Thanksgiving and the winter break, and that attendance was historically low, about 70% at the high school,” K-8 campus Principal Becky Hogan said.

At the elementary school campus, Salt Lake Academy offered intersession art classes. (Jet Burnham/City Journals)

John Hancock, principal at the high school campus, said the feedback from parents and students has been overwhelmingly positive.

“A parent commented their student had back-to-back soccer tournaments throughout December, and that the break provided them time and space to compete without playing catch-up for school,” he said.

An optional intersession was offered to students K-12 for three weeks in December and with fewer restrictions and an open-ended curriculum, teachers made it worthwhile for students.

The high school campus held classes focused on catching up and getting ahead academically such as ACT test prep, credit recovery remediation and elective credits. Athletes also got extra hours of sports practice and conditioning. About 100 students took advantage of the classes, many more than administrators expected.

“The benefit I've heard from a student was that they are happy they don't have to worry about a course they were going to have to remediate,” Hancock said.

The elementary school intersession provided classes for differentiated needs, whether it was needing to be retaught or to have more academic challenge.

“The art of the sell was, if you need remediation, we're going to meet you where you're at,” Hogan said. “So if you're a second grader but you need first grade reading, we're going to give you first grade reading for three weeks and really make some gains. Those kids got three weeks of intense instruction.”

Students performing above grade level joined classes with older students who are their intellectual peers. And multilingual students got three weeks of targeted language progress and completed testing that would normally take them out of class. Hogan said, academically, the intersession helped all students be better prepared for state testing scheduled at the end of January. 

Students learn a new technique in a watercolors class taught by a SLA staff member. (Jet Burnham/City Journals).

But after a morning of academic rigor, afternoons were dedicated to fun, interactive, interest-based, hands-on learning activities. Week-long elective options included classes on watercoloring, card making, choir and mindfulness. In Fun with Cardboard, students created 3D art and engineered building projects. In another class, students researched animals, created a March Madness bracket and had class discussions about which animals would win each match-up.

“It's such a fun way, and it's so memorable for the kids to do this,” Hogan said. “They don't even know that they're learning all these really cool facts about animals, and it was just a really clever way to do some fun stuff.”

Hogan said it reminded her of her elementary school experience.

“Education had space for all these different hands-on projects when we were kids, and now it's very data driven and high stakes testing driven, so these three weeks allowed us to step outside of that and still learn and make it really fun,” Hogan said.

Elective classes were chosen and taught by staff members and community volunteers. Teachers chose one week to teach and two weeks for a break. The schedule adjustment was worked into their contract by starting the academic year in early August. Part time aides and employees were given an option to work two weeks of the intersession to earn extra hours.

“Every teacher got a passion project, something that they really love but don't always get to squeeze into a day,” Hogan said.

A behavior aid staff member taught the Fun with Cardboard class, and had an opportunity to interact with new students and strengthen relationships with those she already knew.

Students make holiday crafts in a Christmas Around the World elective. (Jet Burnham/City Journals)

Special Education teacher Naena Bland, who is a pro football player slated for the flag football Olympic tryouts, taught an athletic movement class with her husband (who does it professionally). They had kids doing agility training, running speed ladders, pivoting and jumping like professional athletes.

“It's really cool that she's our SpEd teacher and she never gets an opportunity to do that, but she's a pro level athlete, and so then she gets to do this passion project,” Hogan said.

Students signed up for one, two or three weeks of classes. Those who didn’t attend were given optional enrichment packets and encouraged to use online reading and math programs during their break. Faculty followed up with these families and students were incentivised to complete the work, but there was no consequence if families opted to take the free time for a family vacation, or to just simplify their December schedule.

Very few middle school students participated in intersession classes because it is a busy time for soccer players. Many traveled for tournaments and for youth soccer scouting and recruiting events.

SLA board member Darrell Robinson said the flexibility to implement this kind of scheduling experiment is one of the benefits of a charter school. He was impressed with how well it worked to meet the varying needs of families.

“There's a win-win, because if you want the break, take the break, and if you want to bring them in, or if you want to take part of the break, you can bring them in — I mean, who can complain about this?” he said.