Year-round schools and the politics of time

This ethnographic study explores the politics of time in a multitrack, "yea r-round" school in inner-city Los Angeles. We analyze different types and e xperiences of time within the school and time collisions across institution s in this densely populated immigrant community. Viewing time as a conteste d commodity, we examine the politics behind the presumed impartiality of th e clock and calendar. The school's year-round schedule is especially proble matic, involving multiple tracks with lengthened days and a shortened schoo l year. We show how issues of educational equity go to the core of debates over alternative school schedules.