FUQUAY-VARINA, N.C. — Hilltop Needmore Road Elementary School is opening in Fuquay-Varina today, as a Track 4 calendar school. This push by Wake County Public School to change year-round, multi-track schools to just a one track school could help reallocate resources in underutilized schools.
Back in the early 2000s, Wake County Public Schools, the state’s largest school district, began adopting year-round calendars as an option for families. These schools consist of four rotating schedules called tracks, with students attending for nine weeks at a time before one track, tracks out. Meaning students and staff get breaks periodically at different times throughout the school year instead of a long summer like traditional school.
This calendar was utilized due to a population boom of students in the district, but now many of these schools sit empty.
In a report released by Elon Univeristy and Wake County Public School System, in the 2023-2024 school year, nearly 40% of year round schools operated at less than a 45% capacity. In May of this year, the Board of Education approved eight schools in Wake County will change to Track 4 calendars to better utilize multitrack year-round school buildings…