Many times in school, you will hear students and staff complain about the long hours and long weeks. There are several pros and cons to shortening a week to 4 days. Some advantages to a four-day week include a reduced amount of discipline. With shorter weeks comes a smaller chance of discipline referrals. It is also proven that when a school has four day weeks, the school's overall attendance improves. The article I refer to it states that “the Melstone School District in Melstone, Mont., has reported statistics indicating that their attendance improved as much as 20 percent over two years after moving to a four-day school week.” This is because students are less overwhelmed with school, and feel comfortable going without fear and anxiety about homework, etc. Although there are many more pros to four-day weeks, the last one I will discuss is reducing financial costs. With a shorter week, bus driver salaries decrease, the amount of lunch and breakfast decreases. This causes these programs to be reduced by around 20%, causing the school to benefit financially.
Although there are many pros for a four-day week, there are also some cons against the four-day weeks. Some examples are scheduling problems at home. Although students would go to school for four days, working parents would still have to work all week. This causes issues especially with families who are less fortunate and can not afford daycare, babysitters, etc. Another negative effect is it allows more opportunities for students to get in trouble outside of school. It has been proven that in larger areas with four-day school weeks, their juvenile detention rates increased.
I think that overall students and staff would benefit from four-day school weeks. I believe that it would show an increase in attendance and grades. I believe that it gives students a chance to live a life, work a job, and earn money outside of school. With less school time, districts will begin to see a change in students' and staff's attitudes. Many will be better rested, and less stressed about coming to school. I think it would benefit schools, and I hope to see this happen someday.
What do you think about four-day school weeks?
Do you think schools should change?
https://education.seattlepi.com/advantages-four-day-school-week-1548.html
https://greengarageblog.org/15-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-the-4-day-school-week
Replies
Great job Lily!!I would love a four day work week!
If you were to take a day off what day of the week what would it be? And if we had a extra day off each week the teachers would just give us more homework to make up that day. But for the most part I think the pros out weigh the cons.
I would want Wednesdays off. I think that teachers wouldn't really assign "extra" just the normal amount already given.
i used to go to a school that did somthing simmilar but instead not going one day they just shortened fridays so we got out earlier it did help with homework and sports so students wouldnt miss any classes. but that also ment we had less time in the class room so not everyone was able to get help on everything they needed.
I think that it could be good in some cases like kids getting more time to relax but that means the school year would have to go into summer more. So i think that it would be for the best for the school week to be the same but if we did change it then every other week have Friday off to have a longer weekend.
4 day school weeks seem nice, but it feels like we'd have to cut out either a lot of breaks including summer break or have to stay in school for longer. If it's the later then I'm perfectly fine with that, having to spend an extra hour in school every day (which I already did before coming to Harlan with 7am start time) and it wasn't that bad. Though a good idea might be to just start school an hour earlier, like at 7 am cause then you'd still get out at the standard 3 PM time. Or stick with a 5 day schedule and start at 7am get out at 2pm.
Although 4 day weeks can cause issues, the familes can adjust to the schedule. My cousin attends a school with a 4 week schedule, but the days end at 3:30pm rather than 3. Overall I don't think 4 day weeks are such a bad idea.
While it could be beneficial to most, I don't think schools should have four day weeks. Like you mentioned, it could create problems with home scheduling. It could also lead to multiple out-of-school activities using that day for practices or other things, which can become overwhelming to some. Although having a 4-day school week seems nice, I think in the long run, it wouldn't help a whole lot.
I agree. I think the idea of shorter weeks sounds nice, would it be worth the scheduling problems?
There would be some positives and negatives to a four day school week. However, I think we should keep it at 5 days. Although I would love that extra day of the weekend it might end up taking away from us. I have couzins in Colorado who have a four day school week, but there summer is way shorter than ours. This is because they have to go farther into the summer to meet the madatory amount of days you have to go to school. Even though school is off, athletes would very likely have to go into practice anyways, resulting in them still going to the school for a couple hours. All in all, I don't think this would be super beneficiary, because our summer would be shorter, and athletes would have to go in anyways.
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