The Virginia Pilot has an Editorial this morning that calls for the end to the so-called “King’s Dominion Law,” which stipulates schools must start after Labor Day. Most of Virginia’s school systems already use a waiver to get around this law.
There is no hard and fast rule that dictates when a law has outlived its usefulness, or when it is no longer relevant. But when more localities have received permission to bypass a law rather than live by it, there’s a clear signal that its time has passed.
Such is the case with Virginia’s so-called “King’s Dominion Law,” a statutory requirement that local school divisions resume classes after Labor Day. Of the state’s 132 school divisions, 77 have obtained a waiver to open earlier.
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Virginia’s law, supported primarily by the tourism and hospitality industries, has become an anachronism that puts public school students a step behind their counterparts in other states, not to mention the rest of the world.
Dels. Robert Tata of Virginia Beach and Greg Habeeb of Salem are among the lawmakers this year proposing to give local divisions greater flexibility to determine when they start the academic calendar. Their efforts may finally prove successful, given that Gov. Bob McDonnell announced last week that he would support a change.
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The current practice of requiring municipalities to seek permission imposes an arbitrary obstacle that hinders communities from deciding what is in the best interests of their young people. The time has come for that to change.
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