Due to changes in the football schedule, the 2012 fall break has been moved to a two-day break on Oct. 4 and 5, just before the midpoint of the semester.
Class meetings on Oct. 11, Nov. 21 and Nov. 22 have been restored.
Jerry Gilbert, provost and executive vice president, said the Tennessee game that was originally scheduled for Oct. 11 was moved to Saturday of the same week.
“We have a calendar committee that sets the schedule,” he said. “The (football) schedule was changed with the addition of the new teams into the conference.”
Gilbert said Mississippi State University officials would not normally change the academic calendar this late in the year, but the calendar committee, which has student representatives from various campus organizations, felt the circumstances warranted a few accommodations.
“As soon as the announcement was made that we no longer had a Thursday night game, Rhett Hobart requested that we consider a different day for fall break,” he said. “His suggestion was that it should back up against a weekend when there was not a home football game, so we went to a Thursday and a Friday that was prior to an away game.”
Rhett Hobart, Student Association president, said multiple student groups and individuals expressed an interest in changing the date of fall break.
“After weighing everything, I felt from the opinions I was getting that it was more important to have students be able to succeed in their course work and not get overloaded throughout the whole October and November months,” he said. “We felt the timing of the (new) fall break dates coincided great with our fall schedule … it gives students a true break at the midway point in the fall semester.”
Gilbert said the change was made to better serve the student body.
“We wanted to respond to the desires of the students,” Gilbert said. “This appeared to be a good way to accommodate a fall break in the mid-part of the semester, which is probably better in actually providing some time off mid-semester rather than waiting until Thanksgiving. Typically, we’ll use an October fall break.”