Understanding Make-Up Days and the School Calendar

Dear Families, Students, and Staff,

We’ve received a few questions about make-up days this year and how those decisions are made. We want to share an update on how instructional time is counted and where we are right now.

Virginia public schools must be in session for either 180 days or 990 instructional hours each school year. Albemarle County Public Schools (ACPS) meets the requirement using instructional hours.

Our school day is 6 hours, which is longer than the state minimum of 5.5 hours. This allows us to meet the required number of hours with fewer days on the calendar.

The 2025-26 calendar includes 1,059 instructional hours, which is 69 hours above the state minimum. These additional hours—often called “banked time”—allow us to cover some delays or closures without making up every missed day.

ACPS tracks missed instructional time throughout the year. To date, after accounting for all calendar adjustments, we have 6 hours (one full instructional day) remaining in our banked time.

For clarity, here are the adjustments we’ve made to the 2025-26 adopted calendar:

• We converted February 16, February 17, and March 19 from non-student days to regular school days to help recover lost instructional time from winter weather closures.
• We converted April 21 to a non-student day due to the Virginia special election. Students will not report to school on this day, and it will instead be used for employee training, teacher work time, and professional learning.

At this time, no additional make-up days are needed. If additional closures exceed our remaining 6 hours (one full instructional day) of banked time, the following options are available:

• Temporarily extend the length of the school day
• Add days to the end of the school year
• Request a waiver from the state

If any additional changes are needed, we will share updates and expectations using our usual communication methods.

Thank you for your continued flexibility and support.