For First Time, A Real Labor Day

Posted on June 27, 2005

Carolina will hold classes on Labor Day this year – for what appears will be the first time in more than three decades.

University Registrar David Lanier ’72 says Carolina had to add a day to the 2005-06 academic calendar after the UNC System recently upped the number of instructional minutes universities are required to have per credit hour.

“We’re under different calendar rules now,” he said. “We have to have 750 minutes per credit hour, and since most of our classes are three credit hours, that comes to 2,250 minutes per three-hour class.” He said other options were considered, such as starting classes a week earlier or ending final exams later.

Lanier had believed that UNC had not had classes on Labor Day before, but subsequent research – after that erroneous report was included in an online news story posted in June in “From the Hill Online” and in the July/August issue of the Carolina Alumni Review – revealed that classes were held on Labor Day 1972.

“For this particular calendar,” Lanier said, “this was the best option. Or the best of the worst options.”

The recently approved calendar for the 2006-07 does not include classes on Labor Day.

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