I think it would be good. Need A/C in schools.
**Before someone assumes all schools have A/C, no they don't. Many don't even have adequate heating or ventilation.
Four Day School Weeks
- Thread starter CyState85
- Start date
I think it would be good. Need A/C in schools.
**Before someone assumes all schools have A/C, no they don't. Many don't even have adequate heating or ventilation.
I'm split on the issue as I can see the pros and cons from both angles. I have a family member that is a shared superintendent for 2 rural schools and their school boards are researching this as they are having an issue getting enough qualified candidates to fill their positions right now. I get the need to attract/retain teachers and this is 1 way to entice them. But if enough school districts go this route it really won't solve the staffing problems long term as the more schools that do this the less of a competitive advantage it will be with more schools doing it. Then the schools that stay 5 days are still at a disadvantage recruiting new staff so in a sense going to 4 days is really just kicking that can down the road on a bigger problem than it really is solving the actual issue which is adequate funding and paying teachers better. Our school district already has early outs every Wednesday for professional development so we technically are already at a 4.5 day school week.
As a parent my concern is does the longer school day really benefit their learning as it would seem that longer days even if there are 4 not 5 days would burn kids out more during the school day where they may "check out" at some point in the day and are not as assertive with learning as they would be with a shorter day. I'm sure there are all kinds of studies out there on this that I need to research. It also means that after school activities would either end later in the evening or have to come in before school to practice more too so that's another trade off with time commitments with a longer day. And the "some parents use schools as a daycare" is kind of a broad statement. There are still some households that both parents work jobs outside of the home where now having a day their kids don't have school is going to cause a strain either financially for having to find child care or having to find a way for 1 of the parents to be home which could mean a job change or working less hours. While many of us probably are financially sound enough or have at least 1 person that can work from home to adjust to a change like that there are some people it would be a real challenge for them to do that so yes that is a legit factor these schools have to consider when you have programs that fund free lunches for some kids where that may be their best meal of the day unfortunately.
I know the big change my school made when I was growing up was sometime when I was in junior high I think is they went from 8 periods to 4 "block" periods where instead of having 8 periods every day with 1 or 2 of those a rotation period for PE, Art, Music, etc you would have 4 blocks a day so you would have a subject for a 90 minute block every other day instead of the same subject every day for like 45 or 50 minutes. Not the same big change as going from a 5 to 4 day school week but still a significant change in the school schedule/structure. It's going to draw a lot of people that have strong feelings 1 way or another about a 4 day school week and is going to be a tough decision for school boards to make because they have to balance being able to properly staff/fund a school with the best interests of the people that live in their school district that have a say when it comes to voting on measures to fund the school as well as who serves on the board too.
As a parent my concern is does the longer school day really benefit their learning as it would seem that longer days even if there are 4 not 5 days would burn kids out more during the school day where they may "check out" at some point in the day and are not as assertive with learning as they would be with a shorter day. I'm sure there are all kinds of studies out there on this that I need to research. It also means that after school activities would either end later in the evening or have to come in before school to practice more too so that's another trade off with time commitments with a longer day. And the "some parents use schools as a daycare" is kind of a broad statement. There are still some households that both parents work jobs outside of the home where now having a day their kids don't have school is going to cause a strain either financially for having to find child care or having to find a way for 1 of the parents to be home which could mean a job change or working less hours. While many of us probably are financially sound enough or have at least 1 person that can work from home to adjust to a change like that there are some people it would be a real challenge for them to do that so yes that is a legit factor these schools have to consider when you have programs that fund free lunches for some kids where that may be their best meal of the day unfortunately.
I know the big change my school made when I was growing up was sometime when I was in junior high I think is they went from 8 periods to 4 "block" periods where instead of having 8 periods every day with 1 or 2 of those a rotation period for PE, Art, Music, etc you would have 4 blocks a day so you would have a subject for a 90 minute block every other day instead of the same subject every day for like 45 or 50 minutes. Not the same big change as going from a 5 to 4 day school week but still a significant change in the school schedule/structure. It's going to draw a lot of people that have strong feelings 1 way or another about a 4 day school week and is going to be a tough decision for school boards to make because they have to balance being able to properly staff/fund a school with the best interests of the people that live in their school district that have a say when it comes to voting on measures to fund the school as well as who serves on the board too.
I’m trying to think of a school in my area that doesn’t have AC. A lot of geo thermal. The ones that didn’t and/or had poor ventilation used the C-word money to take care of that a year or two ago.
The school I work in doesn't and most schools in the district don't which I think is common in larger/city districts.
From what I undestand their systems are old and take a huge overhaul to install A/C etc.
Newer schools that have A/C are the ones that host summer school.
The schools around us are mostly smaller. I actually asked my wife after my last post and we were trying to think of a school in our area that hadn’t done a new building for at least one segment of kids. We came up with her district being the longest to not have done one and their elementary went up around 2004
At least where I live the private school tuition "bump" was used to fund increases in teacher salaries. Needed to stay in line with recent increase in public school teacher salaries.
IMO it also serves to limit enrollment growth because they don't want to increase building/classroom size.
My wife and several of her friends think year round would be better for staff. Give them a break from it also. Very common now for parents to randomly pull kids for family vacations for a week or better. That create a nice chunk of extra work for the teacher. That was an extremely uncommon event back in the Dino days of mine.
Some Des Moines public schools went to year-round about a decade ago and I believe it only lasted a few years. While promoted as benefiting students, seemed like experienced teachers liked and had gotten used to 2ish months off.
Also from a facility standpoint, I recall costs went up because there is a difference in a building being empty for 8ish weeks vs. 1-3 weeks with year round school.
And? I see this comment all the time on here. What does it even mean? Yes, as a parent I would prefer my kids school hours overlap with normal business hours. Most working parents would just be paying child care on the 5th day. Childcare that’s already mostly unavailable and unaffordable.
Just like the cost of college. Take what students are willing to pay, and just add the student loans on top of that. Step 3, profit.
Not sure if this is what the poster meant, but I would guess something like a 10-20% of parents/families don't give a flying rip about their kids learning anything. School is just a way to get the kids out of their hair for some hours of the day, so they can go to work, or run errands, or get high, or whatever they do.
I heard a parent once yell at a principal because their student was just there to learn the 9-5 working world.
I think the answer is super mega consolidation. Like instead of 3 month on 1 week off, or 4 days a week, or whatever--
just make all school totally consecutive. 4 years of 12 hour days with no weekends or breaks would add up to about what we have now for instructional hours.
And kids would be ready for college at 9! Optimization thru maximization. I don't see any downsides really.
I mean we are okay changing child labor laws, why not make it 10 years of age.
Longer days. They are trying to save money and trying to hire young teachers( who can't seem to be able to work 5 days a week). No evidence that it will help kids. Going to be a lot of kids just sitting around their house staring at their phones. Some probably won't get fed well either. More money for day care as well.
Year round school isnt new. I grew up in California in elementary school in the early 90s and they had 4 pods of school. At any given time only 3 pods were in school. I think it was 3 months on 1 month off for each pod. It was more about over population of the school. They couldn’t fit all the kids into the building
Its likely less that they 'can't work 5 days a week' and more that they have better options if they're going to work 5 days. Going 4 days is a selling point they can try to offer. Especially for districts that might be in that 'remote but drivable' distance from a metro area, it might be easier to convince a teacher living in a metro to do a long commute into a small town if they only have to make that drive 4x a week.
