Why isn’t February 29th a Holiday?

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It’s Leap Day! February 29th is a day that only comes around (approximately) every 4 years thanks to our non-sensical 12-month calendar. On centurial years (think 1700, 1800, 1900, 2000), Leap Day only occurs if the year is divisible by 400. So while 2000 did see a Leap Day, 1900, 1800, and 1700 did not.

This day is obviously special…so why isn’t it a Holiday?!

Are you honestly going to tell me that all the people who only get a true birthday or special anniversary once every 4 years are going to have to spend it at work? Or school?

If nothing else, these people should get some kind of “get out of work free” pass for every single Leap Day in their entire lives.

As a teacher, I spent the entire day telling my students that, “We don’t usually have school on February 29th, so we shouldn’t today either!” The ones who get what a Leap Day is seem to agree.

Out of sheer curiosity, I went back to see what day of the week every Leap Day of my entire life had fallen on. As a 1985 baby, here are the results:

1988 — Monday (I was too young for school at this point.) 1992 — Saturday (No School!) 1996 — Thursday (School — this would have been 4th grade.) 2000 — Tuesday (School — this would have been 8th grade.) 2004 — Sunday (I was in college at this point, but YAY, No School!) 2008 — Friday (My first year out of college and between teaching jobs, so no school for me!) 2012 — Wednesday (Teaching!) 2016 — Monday (Teaching!) 2020 — Saturday (No School! Although later that year I would miss being in school…) 2024 — Thursday (Teaching!)

To sum it all up, during my K-12 school career I only had to attend school on 2 Leap Days, and during my career as a teacher, this is only my 3rd Leap Day!

So…give us all a break, please! Let’s make Leap Day a holiday and let everyone relax and enjoy this extra day our crazy orbit around the sun has afforded us!

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