Photo used under a Creative Commons license with AshBash!After nearly three decades of being forced to keep its schools closed before Labor Day, Virginia will—you guessed it—continue to knuckle under the unyielding power of the roller coaster lobby.
Just over a month after state senators last attempted to overturn a 1986 law that compels nearly all public schools in the commonwealth to begin their academic years after Labor Day, the Virginia Senate’s Education and Health Committee rejected the repeal again.
The regulation, known as the “King’s Dominion law” after the Doswell theme park, is backed by the tourism industry, which insists that giving kids a few extra days of summer vacation is better for Virginia than, say, a school year that gives students more time in the classroom and allows parents to stop wasting precious paid vacation days on their children.
The law puts Virginia a step behind other states, opponents say. MIchigan is the only other state in the U.S. where the public school year begins after Labor Day. Gov. Bob McDonnell is among those who would like to undo the “King’s Dominion law,” but the allure of squeezing out a few more days’ worth of sales tax revenue from pricey tickets ($60 for adults at the gate!) and all the junk sold inside the park is just too strong for some.
Yesterday’s vote, which upheld the measure on a 9-6 vote, was just the latest failed attempt to put Virginia on a school calendar that mirrors those of its neighbors.
“School calendars really should not be held hostage by the tourism industry” Jane Strauss, chairwoman of the Fairfax County School Board, told WTOP after the law was sustained. “We have a tremendous need to rearrange our calendar to be more in sync with the rest of the nation.”
But it was State Sen. George Barker, a Fairfax Democrat, who made the argument that more tax revenue was a better bet for Virginia than more school. Districts in areas with heavy snowfall can be exempted from accommodating the demands of the tourism industry.
Still, when it comes to public education in Virginia, the king’s ransom delivered by King’s Dominion reigns supreme.
