Back to school already?

The scene at Skyview CCS Elementary School Monday morning was typical for a first day of school.

Parents snapped photos of wide-eyed kindergartners shuffling toward their new teachers. Older students donated supplies to their classrooms’ stash. And mothers gripped lattes in doorways, catching up with one another.

But there are differences among Skyview CCS and other local schools. Skyview Continuous Curriculum School students start their new year at least two weeks sooner than most pupils. At six weeks long, their summer vacation is half the length of other schools’. And every six weeks during the year, the school breaks for five to 10 days.

Skyview CCS is the only year-round school in the Spokane and Coeur d’Alene area’s major districts.

“We come back refreshed, ready to teach again,” said Kathy Gordon, who teaches a combined class of fifth- and sixth-grade students. “The kids come back ready, too.”

Parents Monday said the greatest benefit of year-round schooling is that their children don’t forget everything they learned the previous year during the abbreviated summer vacation. Students also stay motivated in class knowing that a reprieve from studies is around every corner, parents said.

“They don’t lose their reading levels,” said Susan Kinnune, who was dropping off her fourth-grade son, Conner. “Every six weeks their little brains get a break.”

Test scores or other statistics weren’t available at Skyview CCS, but national research supports what teachers and parents there have observed.

A 1996 analysis of 39 studies found that long summer vacations can cause students to lose up to a month’s worth of learning. Math and spelling scores suffer more than other subjects, the University of Missouri at Columbia analysis found.

Students from poor families lose the most knowledge, possibly because they don’t have as many learning opportunities between June and September as more privileged students do, the analysis said.

(About 31 percent of Skyview CCS students receive free or reduced-priced lunch, which is lower than the district average of 39 percent to 47 percent, said Debra Howard, East Valley School District Assistant Superintendent of Operations.)

About 200 students, kindergarten through seventh grade, attend Skyview CCS. Thirty of those students live in other districts and opt into East Valley.

The school dropped its eighth-grade class this year because only about eight students remained after others either moved or transferred, Principal Chiere Martyn said. The class was small from the start, she said.

The 7-year-old school sometimes loses middle-school-age children to the traditional schools where there are more extras, such as after-school sports, Martyn said. Enrollment is strong in the younger grades, she said, and Jan Beauchamp, assistant superintendent for academic affairs, said parents called throughout the day Monday trying to enroll their children in the program.

Two weeks from now, the Skyview CCS building will fill up with 280 more students. Those pupils take classes in another wing of the building and follow a traditional calendar.

Martyn, who is principal of both programs, said the arrangement works well, and the most noticeable issue is how quiet the halls are when one group is on vacation.

“The kids themselves take it all very naturally,” she said.

In the CCS wing on Monday, 7-year-old Monica Howard helped her classmate, Hannah Dedera, also 7, find a desk in the second-grade classroom.

“Your spot is over here,” she told Hannah, who was sporting two curly-haired pigtails.

Monica’s mom, Lisa Howard, said that even though Skyview CCS students spend 180 days in school, just like other East Valley School District pupils, the year-round calendar feels more family friendly.

“I feel like we get more time with her,” Lisa Howard said. “I guess more quality time.”

Nine other Washington school districts have at least one year-round school, but Skyview CCS is unique in the Spokane area.

West Valley School District Superintendent David Smith said his district hasn’t converted a school to a year-round schedule because there hasn’t been a demand for it.

In many districts, including Central Valley and Coeur d’Alene, students can attend summer school to ease the transition to the next grade level. About 375 Central Valley students did so this summer. Superintendent Mike Pearson doesn’t have statistics to show how summer school might be improving test scores, but said he’s working on compiling those numbers.

In the Spokane School District, Associate Superintendent Nancy Stowell said that several years ago, some teachers explored the prospect of year-round schooling using grant funds. But the ideas never materialized.

Instead, Stowell said, Spokane Schools and other districts “are looking at how to better utilize the time when students aren’t in school.”

That means more after-school homework clubs, activities held during the winter break, and summer school, she said.

Skyview CCS parents and teachers overwhelmingly supported their version of “summer school” Monday. Although a few students bemoaned having to return to classes on a 95-degree day, others seemed oblivious to the fact that there might be some other way.

Families said the only complication comes when one child is on the year-round calendar and another, usually older, sibling is on the traditional schedule. Somehow they manage, though.

“When you find a good school, you make it happen,” parent Ann Ladd said.