Answer
First off, if we didn't have to consider ANYTHING else, in theory we could.
However, let me tell you what that would look like... and why we can't.
Indiana requires 180 student days of attendance in a calendar year. The state will grant a waiver for a few days to be used at the discretion of a school corporation, say for staff development. For the sake of the argument, let's say the state says that you have to have in person attendance for 175 instructional days. We will use the 2026-27 school year as an example.
If we began the year the Tuesday after Labor Day, school would begin on September 8th. You would be in attendance every day until Thanksgiving Day. That means no Fall Vacation and no day off on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. (That's 57 instructional days) You would return to school on November 30 and continue until December 22nd (17 instructional days) Christmas Vacation would be December 23-January 3. Return to school on January 4th...until January 20th. (No MLK Day off - 13 instructional days -- and end of Semester One - 87 student days).
January 21 (new semester begins) until March 31st. (50 instructional days) Take a long weekend for Spring Break. (April 1-4) Return to finish the year -- April 5 until May 28th (40 instructional days) Second semester total - 90 student days.
That would leave 2 days for whatever would be decided....President's Day off....and extra day at Spring Break....a flex day Friday...only 2 extra days to work with assuming the state allowed 175 student days. We would also have to assume that there are no snow days, or the state allowing e-learning for every snow day used and that isn't the way the current law works.
The whole point of my exercise is -- with the required number of days the state requires, it would be a "schedule from hell" for everyone involved if we restrict the calendar from a Labor Day beginning to a Memorial Day ending. Students AND teachers need more breaks throughout the year than what this kind of schedule can give.
The other reality of the situation -- we really need to be on as close to a schedule as we can with Kokomo due to our SPED co-op. Believe me, when I was on the Board (especially in 2019) I tried to push for a bit of an alternative calendar -- at least as a point of discussion and I was shut down because of this very point.
The time some experienced (not me!) of that Labor Day to Memorial Day calendar just won't work. If it COULD work, it would be brutal and not very functional.