Why does school start in the fall? There’s actually a very good reason for this, and it dates back more than a century!
The Real Reason the School Year Doesn’t Start in January
Updated on Jul. 29, 2025
It always feels like the year has two “new beginnings,” doesn’t it? The first one is obviously when the new calendar year begins in January and we say goodbye to the previous year. The second is when a new school year starts in the fall (or late summer, depending on where you live in the country).
It’s a little weird, though, right? Why does school start in the fall, and why doesn’t the school year line up with the calendar year? How did late August/early September become the default time of year for the start of school?
To find out, Reader’s Digest spoke to renowned educational researcher Thomas R. Guskey, PhD, professor emeritus in the College of Education at the University of Kentucky. Read on to learn something interesting … and maybe even impress your kids.
Get Reader’s Digest’s Read Up newsletter for more fun facts, humor, cleaning, travel and tech all week long.
Why does school start in the fall?
School generally starts in the fall because the school year dates back to when the farming schedule took precedence over everything else—yes, even school. “When our first compulsory education laws were passed, just before the Civil War, we were pretty much in agrarian society,” says Guskey, “so there was this concern that children needed to be home to help out with farm duties, especially during the growing season.”
So schooling in areas with large farming communities took place in the colder months, when nothing could be planted or harvested. That way, kids were able to help with the livestock and other farm duties during the busy time. Districts would organize schooling around local needs; schools in areas with large fall harvests, for example, would have time off in September and October.
And it should be noted that prior to 1890, students in major urban areas were in school almost year-round (attending class between 251 and 260 days per year, punctuated by a few short breaks). Why? Those cities didn’t rely on farming to make a living.
How did the modern school year come to be?
As education gained importance, the school system needed more structure and uniformity. In 1852, Massachusetts became the first state to enact a compulsory public education law, making it mandatory for both rural and urban areas to offer schooling; parents who didn’t send their children to school were fined.
“It was because of the work of people like Horace Mann,” Guskey explains. “In England, where you had this hierarchy of status, education was for the well-to-do and royalty. And the idea was that here, where all men are created equal, a common system of education was considered to be necessary for all.”
By about 1900, a compromise was made between urban and rural school systems to run at the same times of the year, starting around Labor Day and ending around Memorial Day (formerly known as Decoration Day). That way, kids could help on the farm during the summer while still receiving a standard education.
In terms of the number of mandated days in the school year, “180 days is pretty much the go-to across the states,” says Guskey. “But that does vary from state to state, and in some cases, among districts within the state.” Colorado has lowest minimum number of required school days in the nation with 160; Kansas has the most with 186.
Why does the school year start earlier in the southern states?
The school year starts earlier in the South for one very practical reason: because it gets hotter earlier in the year. “They tried to avoid the hottest times of the year,” Guskey says. Hot summers in the South mean many schools aim to end classes in May (before the peak of June and July heat) and then start up again in August.
Also, keep in mind, the modern convenience of air-conditioning that we take for granted didn’t exist, so ending earlier was once a practical necessity—and then the calendar stuck.
Does the school year around the world start in the fall?
Many countries, like Canada and much of Europe, start the school year in the fall like the U.S. But others follow different academic calendars based on geography and climate.
Australia, for example, starts its school year in late January, after the summer season ends Down Under. Other countries in the Southern Hemisphere (like South Africa, Argentina, Brazil and New Zealand) start school around the same time (between January and early March).
“We were the first to implement mandated compulsory education,” says Guskey. “But other nations took that model of mandatory education and bumped it up several levels. Internationally, we are behind the rest of the world in terms of what number of days we do require.” Canada, France and the United Kingdom are similar to the U.S., with 180 to 190 days; Australia has 200; Japan mandates between 220 and 240.
Guskey adds that many of the Asian nations and some European nations “divide the school year differently so that instead of having one three-month period off, they break it up and have three one-month breaks.” In the U.K., for example, the academic year is divided into three terms: fall (September to December), spring (January to Easter) and summer (April to July).
What is summer loss?
Regardless of when the extended break in the school year takes place, what concerns Guskey and other educators is “summer loss”: the academic skills kids lose being away from school during the summer. You may also hear this referred to as the “summer slide.”
“Summer loss tends to be greater in some subject areas than others,” Guskey says. “Kids who come from homes that are literacy rich, where there is reading material around and things like that, don’t lose quite as much in terms of literacy as kids who come from a more disadvantaged background.”
Math skills tend to be kind of universally dropped during the summer, he notes. It makes sense when you think about it: Maybe a kid will pick up a book in the summer on her own, but she’s probably not going to sit on the beach doing addition and subtraction.
So, even though most kids today spend their summers at the pool, glued to video games or dodging chores—not helping harvest crops—they have the farming season to thank for those three months of summer freedom. It may not make perfect sense anymore, but hey, if it gets you a break from algebra, who’s complaining?
Additional reporting by Morgan Cutolo.
About the expert
|
Why trust us
At Reader’s Digest, we’re committed to producing high-quality content by writers with expertise and experience in their field in consultation with relevant, qualified experts. We rely on reputable primary sources, including government and professional organizations and academic institutions as well as our writers’ personal experiences where appropriate. For this piece on why school starts in the fall, Jo Ann Liguori tapped her experience as a journalist and longtime magazine editor. We verify all facts and data, back them with credible sourcing and revisit them over time to ensure they remain accurate and up to date. Read more about our team, our contributors and our editorial policies.
Sources:
- Thomas R. Guskey, PhD, professor emeritus in the College of Education at the University of Kentucky and the author/editor of 30 award-winning books, including Grading with Integrity; phone interview, July 22, 2025
- Find Law: “Compulsory Education Laws: Background”
- Infoplease: “School Years around the World”
- Journal of Inquiry & Action in Education: “The History of School and Summer Vacation”
