(a) The board of school directors of each school district shall fix the date of the beginning of the school term. Unless otherwise determined by the board, the daily session of school shall open at nine ante-meridian and close at four post-meridian, with an intermission of one hour at noon, and an intermission of fifteen minutes in the forenoon and in the afternoon. Upon request of a board of school directors for an exception to the aforesaid daily schedule, the Secretary of Education may, when in his opinion a meritorious educational program warrants, approve a school week containing a minimum of twenty seven and one-half hours of instruction as the equivalent of five (5) school days, or a school year containing a minimum of nine hundred ninety hours of instruction at the secondary level or nine hundred (900) hours of instruction at the elementary level as the equivalent of one hundred eighty (180) school days. Professional and temporary professional employes shall be allowed a lunch period free of supervisory or other duties of at least thirty minutes. The provisions of this subsection shall not be construed to repeal any rule or regulation of any board of school directors now in effect which provides for a lunch period longer than the minimum prescribed herein or to repeal any action of any board of school directors taken in compliance with section 7 of the act of July 25, 1913 (P.L. 1024, No. 466),¹ entitled “An act to protect the public health and welfare, by regulating the employment of females in certain establishments, with respect to their hours of labor and the conditions of their employment; by establishing certain sanitary regulations in the establishments in which they work; by requiring certain abstracts and notices to be posted; by providing for the enforcement of this act by the Commissioner of Labor and Industry and others; by prescribing penalties for violations thereof; by defining the procedure in prosecutions; and by repealing all acts and parts of acts inconsistent with the provisions thereof,” as amended.

(b) If a school in any district due to crowded conditions is unable to provide for the full time attendance of all pupils during the school day, the board of school directors, with the approval of the Department of Public Instruction² first obtained, may provide for two half-day sessions.³ The approval of the Department of Public Instruction shall not exceed a period of one year. Annual extensions may be granted by the Department upon review of the circumstances of each case. Each half-day session shall be four (4) hours in duration: Provided, That the Superintendent of Public Instruction may reduce the half-day session in the first and second grades, at the request of a school district, for cogent reasons relating to the health, safety or welfare of the children, if, in his opinion, the school program submitted by the district shows that the local program is adequate for these⁴ grades. Half-day sessions shall be regarded as two regular sessions. Teachers employed for one half-day session shall not be employed for the other on the same day for the entire half-session, but may be required by the school district to serve every school day for the same number of hours prescribed by the board of school directors for regular full-time teachers who teach full day sessions in the same grades in the school district. Upon any violation or failure to comply with the provisions of this subsection, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, on hearing, after two (2) weeks' written notice to the board of school directors, shall withhold and declare forfeited the State appropriation for reimbursement on account of the instruction of the pupils in average daily membership in the sessions in which the requirements are not met.

(c) The board of school directors may fix the date of the school commencement and shall pay such expenses in connection therewith as it may determine.