With new studies coming out about student mental health and high anxiety because of school, certain schools have decided to implement a new four-day school week. The goal is to be test how it affects student health, teacher health, and the overall impact on academic and work performance for students and teachers alike.
The Positives for Students
The new system is mainly being implemented in rural and western parts of the U.S., where many students have mental health issues that cause detrimental effects on their academic performance. With post-COVID studies, many students have a tough time adjusting to achieving academically in school in an entirely different environment. Many students, especially high schoolers like me, went from being in middle school, where schedules were loose, teachers were lax, and the educational course was relatively easy, into much more competitive and demanding curricular courses. The year-and-a-half gap in academic, social, and physical development created by COVID-19 has caused many students to feel stressed and deterred from attending school. This crisis caused by the pandemic among young students has led many more school districts to shift to four-day school weeks. Four-day school weeks would provide students an extra day to rest, to alleviate themselves from the constant stress of keeping up or doing better than their peers, to get rid of the continuous noise of teachers or classmates talking, or an extra day to let students reorganize and do better in class. Among the school districts that have implemented this new system, students have had better overall markings from prior, higher attendance, and overall a better mood when entering the classroom and engaging with teachers and classmates.
Additionally, having an extra day outside of school allows students to engage in more extracurricular activities, which would be better for college and overall academic performance; new skills and hobbies could be learned and developed, opening doors for more opportunities in the future beyond high school. Students who know extra skills or languages that could be developed much further with an additional day of practice will also have an advantage in college or job applications after college. It should be noted, the research on the effects on students hasn’t had enough time yet to be conclusive.
For Teachers
Teachers have also been feeling much more stressed out and stretched due to the educational gaps among children. Many language teachers need help assisting students to catch up to the current curriculum, because they did not take a previous language class during the pandemic. This problem only becomes worse, as the years go on, and students fail to learn symmetrically with their peers. This problem is the same for many other teachers like History, English, Math, etc. With teacher recruitment down, and lower quality due to wage problems, the stretched-thin teacher is exhausted and weary from the high workload. The overloaded teachers have to help students with high anxiety, the lengthy time grading papers pre-COVID, which has been shortened with homework online, has been replaced with additional tutoring sessions and time calling parents. The four-day school weeks would ease the work for teachers who need to grade written work, like English and Language teachers, while also giving teachers time to prepare more high-quality teaching sessions rather than longer and low-quality sessions. The four-day school week would provide teachers with a much easier time handling their jobs; having time to replenish their energy and relax would help teachers teach better and more fairly, as they wouldn’t grade harshly when not tired and in a better mood. The teacher’s responsibility to students to provide their strengths and weaknesses could be better approached when a teacher can perceive students more light-heartedly and open-minded when not stressed from being overworked.
For The Budget
So far, four-day school weeks have been implemented in nearly 900 school districts, an increase from 650 in 2020. Most of the schools making the shift have tight budgets and low teacher counts, to alleviate the stress of the teachers and students, help with budgeting, and saving money and effort. The educational budget disparity for many states’ education widely varies; many states implementing these four-day school weeks have much lower educational budgets per pupil than the standard U.S. average. This budget disparity creates a problem as students’ classes become easier as they have low-quality teachers, and the curriculum becomes easier to adapt to students. With lower educational budgets come lower test scores and attendance; with 4-day school weeks allowing schools to save money on transportation, food, utilities, etc. Some media sources report that schools could save up to 5.4% on 4-day school weeks; the actual savings report is from 0.4% to 2.5% in actual savings. A big question about teacher wages being affected also raised questions; fortunately, no teacher contracts were changed or edited.
The Negatives For Students
Despite the overwhelming positives of having four-day school weeks, many outlying negatives come with allowing children to have more time out of school and lowering the amount of time teachers can engage with students. The preferential treatment of students with four-day school weeks could have adverse physiological effects on neighboring school districts that don’t have the same treatment. There is also the possibility of lower reading and math scores on standardized and national testing for students, as the shorter school week may negatively affect lazy and unwilling students.
High schoolers are already known to be stressed out and often very tired during school; that’s why the school district enabled four-day school weeks. However, not all students would use their extra day off productively. Many high schoolers would rather play games and hang out with friends than go to school. There’s also the risk of having students slack off knowing they can get extra days away from school later; the students that would still skip despite having four-day school days would only be attending three days or less of school a week, which would barely be enough time to cover basic learning, needless study, or help for more important tests or events in the student’s life. A four-day school week is already barely enough time to cover many of the curriculums that states require students to learn; students who find school negligible would run the risk of being held back because of their irresponsibility. The school zones would also create jealousy among youths. It’s easy to imagine students trying to transfer to different schools to get 4-day school weeks despite a longer commute or students trying to make their school district change to a 4-day school week because of the shorter school weeks.
For Teachers
There are also many negative effects that four-day school weeks would have on teachers in the classroom. Teachers would have less time to work with students one-on-one in a classroom if a four-day school week was implemented, meaning that students who have a very hard time with certain subjects would find themselves stuck and unable to receive help without tutoring outside of school. Considering that many school districts enacting this new schedule already had previous problems with lower test scores, it would be wise to wait to enact four-day school weeks as it could harm overall academic performance. Teachers in challenging financial situations, or custodians who make low wages, would lose out on the opportunity to earn as much overtime pay as a result of the new calendar. The teachers would also be under more pressure to cram more information into lessons without the extra day they had beforehand. There have already been reports of estimated lower math and reading scores due to the new schedule, meaning that teachers could lose credibility or miss out on bonuses.
For The Budget
The pandemic left schools with a large leftover budget that could be used to buy textbooks, teachers, and other school supplies. With the big leftover budget, it would be unnecessary for schools to divert from the traditional school calendar to save money. Changing the entire dynamic of a student’s everyday life to save money would have many long-term adverse effects on the quality of students produced in districts and, eventually, the quality of workers produced in colleges. Changing to a four-day school week to save money would have consequential effects that are not evident immediately; this problem would become more prominent as the concept spreads to other states that are pressured to “prioritize” student health despite the real reason being greed and corruption.
Over the next few years, we should have enough data to determine if a four-day week is a realistic option for larger school districts. What do you think?
Sources:
https://ballotpedia.org/Public_education_in_Kentucky
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/school-districts-4-day-week-teachers-parents/
https://www.newamerica.org/education-policy/topics/school-funding-and-resources/school-funding/funding-disparities/
https://www.ncsl.org/education/four-day-school-week-overview#:~:text=Reasons%20for%20implementing%20the%20shorter,from%200.4%25%20to%202.5%25.
https://www.ncsl.org/education/four-day-school-week-overview#:~:text=In%20addition%2C%20some%20studies%20have,lead%20to%20improved%20academic%20performance.
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1197954439#:~:text=Teacher%20contracts%20didn’t%20change,only%20teaching%20four%20days%20now.
https://www.ncsl.org/education/four-day-school-week-overview#:~:text=In%20addition%2C%20some%20studies%20have,lead%20to%20improved%20academic%20performance.