I strongly support both ideas:  both uniforms and year-round schooling are very beneficial to at-risk students.  In fact, there are already schools in Seattle School District who have their students wear uniforms.  Thurgood Marshall Elementary School, for one.  The idea of uniforms is very unpopular with students however!  Just be prepared to stand by your neighborhood schools if that is a route they decide to take.  There are many people (not just students) who believe that school uniforms hinder personal expression and individuality.  I think that school uniforms allow a sense of community and camraderie within a student body, that allows children to see one another as school mates as opposed to radically divided along racial and class lines.

As for year-round schooling, all evidence suggests that it is a model for education that is best for struggling learners who tend to "forget" most of what they learned during the year over the course of summer school.  Teachers are typically very resistant to the idea of switching to a year-round calendar, but colleagues of mine in other districts who have year-round schools tell me that they love it!  Instead of having long sessions of school punctuated by long breaks during which learning is lost, teachers can have frequent breaks and plan their units around shorter lengths of time.  It's all a matter of adjusting to change.  HOWEVER, year round schooling is expensive!  Maintaining bussing, food service, energy expenditures, etc, over the course of the year really adds up.  In a district as financially strapped as Seattle, I have to wonder if a year-round calendar will be best for all schools.  Perhaps it would be right and fair for schools with a high population of migrant kids, struggling learners, and homeless children...

 

--A New Seattle Teacher