Salem Schools May End Good Friday Day Off, Return Before Labor Day

SALEM, MA — Salem Public Schools students will likely be headed back to the classroom before Labor Day and no longer have the Good Friday religious holiday off from school as part of a proposed 2025-26 school calendar.

Superintendent Steve Zrike proposed the preliminary calendar ideas at Tuesday's School Committee meeting with a discussion and vote set for the Feb. 3 meeting.

Zrike said the new collective bargaining agreement with the Salem Teachers Union allows for an earlier start to the school year and for the ability to eliminate the religious holiday.

Both changes would be aimed at providing an earlier end date to the school year in June in a year that includes days off for elections and the potential for a two-week Christmas holiday break.

Under the proposed calendar, staff would return the week before Labor Day with three days off in-service days before students would likely return on that Thursday, followed by a Labor Day weekend break. The proposal also includes a half day on Halloween — allowing for students and staff to get off the road before the invasion of revelers to celebrate the holiday in its unofficial hometown.

"There is never a perfect way to handle Halloween," Zrike said. "Generally, we got pretty decent feedback this year (on an early release day). ... This year Halloween is on a Friday which, I don't have to tell anyone here, will be a very busy day for the city."

Zrike said no longer having Good Friday off is in line with the district being consistent with religious holidays. Christmas Day is a federal holiday and falls as part of an established vacation.

Students and staff who wish to observe it will be allowed to take it off as part of a religious observance day.

"I got a number of emails about Good Friday," he said. "I know other districts have struggled the first year they've implemented (having) school on Good Friday. I do think it will be rocky the first time through but I do think after that it will be just the way we do things here in Salem.

"Some suggested that we have a half-day on Good Friday. But I don't want to shortchange kids on time in school."

One area of discussion for the Feb. 3 School Committee will likely be the holiday break, which was to begin on Dec. 24 but may be extended to include off days on Dec. 22 (a Monday) and Dec. 23 because of concerns about attendance on those two days after attendance was "very bad" in the two days the district returned from holiday break on Jan. 2 and Jan. 3 earlier this month.

"We had terrible attendance on those two days," Zrike said. "That was the feedback from the teachers that they would like us to consider. I am open to it. That would mean that we would essentially have two full weeks of break."

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)