3 Hartford-area schools first in CT to mark Diwali as holiday

NEWINGTON — Last school year, a 9-year-old student approached Maureen Brummett, superintendent of Newington Public Schools, with a letter.

“He wanted Eid al Fitr to be added to the school holiday calendar because it was creating a challenge for him and his sister who were torn when things at school were scheduled on that holiday,” Brummett said. “I promised him at that time that I would ask the Board of Education to consider it.”

Throughout the fall, the Newington Board of Education discussed the proposal and during those conversations, two other holidays, Diwali and Three Kings Day, were added to the list of scheduled days off from school.

Newington, which officially adopted the updated calendar this spring for the upcoming fall, joins only a handful of other districts in Connecticut to acknowledge these holidays in the school calendar. Newington, Avon and South Windsor are the only three districts in the state to celebrate Diwali with a day off from school in the 2022-23 school year.

Brummett said this decision matches the increasing diversity of the district.

“We are becoming more and more focused on equity for all of our students and acknowledging all the different holidays they celebrate,” Brummett said. “It came down to what message do we want to send to the community.”

The Christian and Jewish holidays already included in the school calendar will remain.

Diwali is celebrated by Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and Sikhs. The festival falls on Oct. 24 this upcoming school year. Eid al Fitr, a Muslim holiday, marking the end of Ramadan, is a school holiday in Bridgeport, Avon, South Windsor and Hamden that will be celebrated April 21, 2023.

Students across the state who celebrate holidays face the decision of missing a day of academics, or the opportunity to celebrate a holiday with their family and community.

One way that Brummett and the Newington Board of Education were able to assess the need for the new holidays was to examine a pattern of absences on those days in the past. While students could take an excused absence to celebrate, many expressed concern about missing crucial academic time.

Last year, about 50 students were absent in Newington on the day Eid al Fitr was celebrated.

“I can tell you some kids came to school anyway even though they would have preferred to have been home to celebrate but were worried about missing academic work,” Brummett said.

Rajeev Desai, of the Vallabhdham Temple in Newington, started advocating with the Newington Board of Education and the superintendent in hopes of making it a school holiday. He has recently moved his activism to Rocky Hill.

The U.S. Census shows that the Asian population of Rocky Hill grew from 9.8 percent in 2010 to more than 18 percent in 2020.

“Once we get it in Rocky Hill, I want to make it a state holiday,” Desai said.

Eric Scoville, director of communications with the state Department of Education, said the decision about which holidays to include will remain up to each school district.

The festival of Diwali is on Avon’s school calendar for the first time in 2022. Rajan Zed, president of Universal Society of Hinduism, applauded Avon, South Windsor and Newington for the decision to add Diwali to the school calendar, but like Desai, pushed for more widespread acknowledgment.

“Awareness about ‘other’ religions thus created by such holidays like Diwali would make Connecticut students well-nurtured, well-balanced and enlightened citizens of tomorrow,” Zed said in a press release.

Adding three holidays to the calendar was a relatively easy process for the Newington Board of Education, according to board member Jessica Weaver.

The district circulated a survey asking parents, students and teachers what they thought of adding new holidays. The board also held a public hearing where Desai presented about Diwali specifically.

The same survey also indicated that parents and teachers wanted to change Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples’ Day.

Weaver said the decision to diversify the calendar is a great step toward acknowledging the South Asian community.

“When we look at Connecticut as a whole and districts as a whole, we have minimal representation from South Asians and it is so important we are able to celebrate those things, particularly religious holidays,” Weaver said. “Other districts can and should do this.”