Commentary: Early school starts have taken August — and even some of July — away from kids

by Niki Kelly, Indiana Capital Chronicle
July 25, 2025

Hoosier kids shouldn’t be in orientation and buying school clothes in late July. Alas, children will soon be back in the classrooms instead of finishing out a nice summer.

Fair warning: I am entering grumpy, boomer territory. But it’s not just my age. Even the younger members of the Indiana Capital Chronicle believe this has gotten out of control.

“September is how the Lord (and the harvest) intended,” a reporter quipped during a Slack conversation this week.

Indeed, all of us remembered starting the academic year around Labor Day, and we grew up across at least six different states.

In 2009, parents pushed the Indiana General Assembly to require a uniform start date, or at least one that was after Labor Day. There were hearings, but ultimately, local control was retained.

The decision is left to individual districts. The Metropolitan School District of Warren Township in Indianapolis started Thursday, for instance. Many others are set to return July 30, July 31 or Aug. 1.

An IndyStar listing covering more than 30 central Indiana districts or schools had Aug. 14 as the latest start date — but that was just one Catholic high school.

The creep toward earlier starts began when educators saw learning loss from the long summer. And thus began the balanced calendar.

But as far as I can tell from recent scores, students aren’t doing any better in recent decades than they were before.

Schools also say it’s necessary to meet the state’s 180-day instructional requirement.

One parent at a 2009 legislative hearing counted the weekdays between the fourth Monday in August and the end of May, showing plenty of days available to meet the requirement without infringing on summer.

“Summertime is a magical time in a child’s life,” he testified. “Three months of fun. No responsibility.”

Instead, schools have largely redistributed time out of the classroom, adding weeklong fall breaks, additional days in December and other small breaks.

Others have argued that utility costs are higher in August, and that kids going back early impacts tourism activities that rely on youth workers.

It’s not just Indiana, though. Pew Research Center found in a 2023 analysis that some students start in late July, with many back by mid-August.

There are differences across geographic regions. Schools tends to start earlier in southern regions than farther north, broadly speaking.

Here is what Pew found:

• More than two-thirds of students in the U.S. Census Bureau’s East South Central division (Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Tennessee) went back to school the week of Aug. 7. They joined another 19% of students who had started classes earlier.
• In the West South Central division (Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas), 94% of students returned to school between Aug. 7 and Aug. 18.
• But in the six New England states, almost no one goes back to school before the week of Aug. 28.
• And students in the Middle Atlantic states (New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania) go back even later. About three-quarters won’t hit the books until after Labor Day, which falls on Sept. 4 this year.

Indiana falls into the East North Central region, with the majority starting in mid-August.

I think it’s time to re-evaluate the school calendars with an eye toward starting later.

Some of my concern is absolutely nostalgia. But I also don’t think the shift has netted students and parents anything of value.

Indiana Capital Chronicle is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Indiana Capital Chronicle maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Niki Kelly for questions: info@indianacapitalchronicle.com.