Juneteenth will be a district holiday for Atlanta Public Schools.
President Joe Biden signed legislation last week declaring a federal holiday to mark the June 19, 1865, date that news of the Emancipation Proclamation, issued more than two years before, reached enslaved people in Texas.
Following that, APS Superintendent Lisa Herring announced the 50,000-student district would adopt Juneteenth “as an official district holiday.”
“Beginning with the 2021-2022 school year and beyond, all APS schools and offices will be closed, and all district activities cancelled, for the Juneteenth holiday,” she said in a written statement posted on the district’s website.
The move is not completely new for APS. Last year, APS employees had the day off as a paid holiday.
Now Herring is looking to make it a permanent fixture in the district’s calendar. She called it an “historic decision.”
“I hope that each and every one of us takes time to reflect on the great significance and reverence of this day. It is also my hope that, moving forward, we continue to learn about and acknowledge our history, celebrate the progress that has been made, pay homage to those who sacrificed to bring us to this point 156 years later, and dedicate ourselves to continuing in our journey to being that more perfect union,” she wrote.
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