Public Schooling Systems Should Operate Year-Round

As an opponent, I would prefer to have someone who is currently in college, or is a professional educator of any sort of institution. My point of views are coming from an American schooling system, I understand other countries may have different schedules. I attended a university that operated on a year-round 11 week quarter schedule, as opposed to the normal 15 week semester. My First Point: the American schooling system schedule originated with respect to the farming schedule. Summers were given as time off so that children could help with life around the farm during the growing months (the most important ones). While this was fair and logical when agriculture was life-sustaining for the average family, and when small farmers were important to the economy, this sort of lifestyle is no longer as prevalent, or time consuming (mostly due to agriculture technology and large agriculture corporations). Our schooling schedule is a relic of the past. My Second Point: data shows that there is a significant drop off in acquired knowledge during the 2-3 months that students have off in the summer. This test data shows a drop off in all major areas of study, particularly language comprehension, writing, and mathematics. This drop off causes a lag in the acquired knowledge/skills for the proceeding year. It causes teachers to use valuable progressive education time to review material that was learned in the previous year and forgotten over the summer break. An attempted countermeasure to this that was implemented decades ago, is summer reading. But this is not enough to maintain the skills acquired from the previous year. (If my opponent decides to disagree with this point, I would be happy to show at least a dozen studies that prove this point) My Third Point: This year-round schedule would greatly help parents, particularly single parents, who work normal hours. During the summer, parents need to either be home, pay for a sitter, or send their child to camp, while they are at work. This year-round schooling would relieve many parents from financial burdens. My Fourth Point: The state and federal governments mandate a minimum required number of hours for students to attend school each year. Most public schools plan and operate on this minimum required schedule, while planning for the potential emergency cancellation day. A year round schedule would allow for more flexibility in adjusting the scheduling, and could accommodate students who observe various religious holidays. My Fifth Point: With a year-round schedule, the aforementioned minimum schedule would be easily met. This could shorten the average school day and allow for more time of the 'arts' that are usually the first ones to be removed during financial hardship. This would also allow for more physical education time, and sports practice time after school. As well as homework time (assuming this type of school system would require homework). My Sixth Point: America's public school system has dropped in it's world ranking. I believe this is largely due to the minimum graduation standard of knowledge, and the knowledge lost during the summer break months. This year-round schedule would allow for students to receive almost an additional year of schooling, relative to the current 4 year schedule, thus allowing for knowledge that reaches into the average college level. Whomever should accept, please stick to the larger points, and avoid such things as, lunch/recess time or vacation time. I would prefer a current educator accept this debate. Thank you, and good luck.