Wake wants to change calendars at 2 schools. See who could switch in 2027.
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Wake County schools propose 2027 calendar switch for two under-enrolled elementaries
- District cites $200K savings and alignment with K–12 traditional schedules
- Surveys show parent and staff opposition citing mental health, retention concerns
Two under-enrolled North Raleigh elementary schools could change calendars over the objections of parents and school staff who want to keep them on a year-round schedule.
Wake County school administrators recommended Tuesday converting North Forest Pines Elementary and Pleasant Union Elementary to a traditional calendar in the 2027-28 school year. Administrators said it’s costing the district money and resources to operate a year-round calendar in an area that’s not seeing much growth.
“This is not an easy process,” Glenn Carrozza, assistant superintendent for school choice, planning and assignment, told the school board on Tuesday. “If this was easy, we probably would have done this a lot over the last several years. I know it’s hard and a lot of you have heard from the public regarding this topic.”
Surveys of parents and employees at both schools found strong support for staying on the year-round calendar. Families and staff cited the benefits they see from the year-round calendar and concerns that switching to a traditional calendar will hurt students.
“People don’t want to change to a traditional calendar,” Katie White, a North Forest Pines parent, told the school board during public comment. “We specifically applied for a calendar transfer to be able to go to a year-round school. It has been a blessing for our family.”
The school board could vote on the calendar conversions on Sept. 2. School board chair Chris Heagarty said hard decisions such as converting both schools could come up with needed money at a time of looming potential federal funding cuts.
“We’re trying to do the most good with the resources that we have,” Heagarty said.
Capacity benefits of year-round calendar
The majority of Wake’s 200 schools operate on a traditional calendar. This means a late August opening, an early June closing and a long summer vacation.
Wake also operates year-round schools in which students take short periodic breaks instead of having a long summer vacation.
In a multi-track, year-round school, the students are split into four rotating groups, called tracks, with three in session and one on break at all times. The multi-track calendar can increase a school’s capacity by 25% or more to provide extra seats in high-growth areas.
But multi-track schools also cost more money to operate because the buildings are in use all 12 months. Wake also puts more money into multi-track schools when they’re under-enrolled to provide them enough staff and resources.
Wake is still growing, but at a much slower rate now. Wake is North Carolina’s largest school district and could eclipse 162,000 students for the first time this fall.
In recent years, Wake has converted schools such as Pine Hollow Middle in Raleigh and Rolesville Middle to a traditional calendar. Some multi-track schools were converted to a single-track, year-round calendar where all students follow the same schedule.
“Where we don’t need it anymore, we’re scaling back,” Carrozza said of the multi-track year calendar.
‘We can’t sustain our current path’
Both North Forest Pines and Pleasant Union are located in the Falls Lake watershed, which limits the amount of residential growth. Carrozza said neither school has long-term crowding concerns and other nearby schools have space.
According to Wake County data, North Forest Pines is at 78% capacity this school year. Pleasant Union is at 81%,
Carrozza said converting the two schools to a traditional calendar could save Wake $197,000 in staffing costs, not including other potential savings.
Another benefit cited by administrators is that the change would provide K-12 calendar consistency for families. Both schools feed into middle schools and high schools that follow a traditional calendar.
“This is a difficult decision,” Carrozza said. “We’ve used all of the other options to date before getting to this decision that we’re sharing with you.
“We’ve used capping. We’ve used reassignments, We’ve used trailers in parts of the county where we have high growth. In order to keep up with the growth, we can’t sustain our current path.”
Families, teachers want to keep year-round
But parents and staff who responded to district surveys said they don’t want to change calendars.
A recurring survey theme was that the year-round calendar reduces burnout and summer learning loss through the frequent breaks. But Carrozza said it was a “myth” that the year-round calendar is superior academically.
A district-commissioned survey said the multi-track calendar “had no discernible impact on student achievement.”
Several people in the surveys also cited mental health benefits they say children have from the consistency of the year-round calendar. But Carrozza said they haven’t been able to find any data to support that argument.
Parents and teachers raised concerns that the calendar change could make both schools less appealing to families who’d choose charter schools and private schools that offer a modified calendar.
Jaymie Boose, a parent and teacher at Pleasant Union Elementary, told the board on Tuesday that any savings would be offset by the loss of staff from the calendar change. She said some employees drive more than an hour because they love working at the school.
“This is going to fundamentally change our school culture,” Boose said. “Staff and families will leave. Not by choice but because many of our staff members will lose months of pay and our entire staff will experience pay schedule changes.”
Some families and staff suggested Wake convert them to a single-track, year-round school as a compromise. Several board members embraced the idea of a single-track calendar on Tuesday but it’s unclear if it has enough votes to pass.
Carrozza said converting the schools to a traditional calendar would provide calendar consistency for families through high school.
“You’re historically not going to get a lot of support for changing school calendars,” Carrozza said. “That’s why we don’t do it a lot.”
This story was originally published August 5, 2025 at 4:21 PM with the headline "Wake wants to change calendars at 2 schools. See who could switch in 2027.."
