To a lot of students at UD, Christmas vacation is the best break from classes of the year. The break can be appreciated largely because academic stress can be put on the backburner: everyone can sit down and relax for a few days since another semester has been completed and you do not have to worry about a test or quiz or homework for a few weeks. The break is enjoyable for many because it is Christmastime and after finals have been completed, students have cheer, home-cooked food, Christmas traditions, family and high school friends waiting for them at home, wherever home may be.

But no matter how good Christmas break may be for many students, it must come to an end, which is for the most part, easily acceptable by those wanting the freedom they have at college. Although every college student has to accept the return to class and campus, UD students face this reality differently every year. Instead of having three or four weeks off for break and about two weeks of a cushion period after New Years, Dayton students are thrown back into the college world just hours after the ball drops.

Now in theory, having to attend classes on January 3rd, as happened in the 2006-2007 school year or the 4th, as occurred in the 2005-2006 school year, does not sound bad. That gives a few days to recover whatever activities an individual does on New Years, right? Wrong. Classes on the 3rd means a student has to arrive back to campus on the 2nd, the day after New Years when people are still recovering from New Years Eve, in addition to the great amounts of recovery many need from the intense family time of Christmas and Christmas shopping and returns. In general, the two weeks for break given by UD is not a sufficient amount of time because of the activities and stress that fill up the two weeks easily: basically, the downtime student look forward too is severely limited.

Beyond the fact that personal time is limited, time that can be spent with friends who attend other colleges is limited. Often in a group of college students, a UD student has the shortest Christmas break. This leaves many students, from both Dayton and everywhere else, why this must be done, especially since Dayton's break is sufficiently shorter than most other colleges; so when a UD student goes back to college, all of his or her friends attending other schools still get more time to hang out and catch up.

UD does have one slightly unique situation though that balances out the short Christmas break: two spring breaks and the semester's end occurring sooner than many other universities. Few students argue against the week-long break in March and shorter break at Easter, but are these that much better than a few more days of relaxation and festive enjoyment of Christmas break? Many would never give up their second semester vacations, but many would just rather postpone its beginning a week or two. The other option that could allow an extension of Christmas break would be to extend the second semester a few days. Is this a hard thing to do? No. Two or three days more in exchange for at least a full three week Christmas break sounds reasonable, especially since many other universities do not adjourn until mid-May anyway. It can be done and should be done.