4 Day School Week

Missouri is considering a measure which would allow public schools to adopt a 4 day school week. The hours of school on Monday - Thursday would be extended to 8 hours to meet the state's requirement for the amount of instruction children must receive.

There are many pros and cons to this idea.

Pros

• School Districts would spend less money on diesel and maintenance for busses
• Schools would save on power bills by only having to maintain a reasonable temperature on 4 days instead of 5
• Teachers would have a full day of planning time to grade paper and prepare for lessons.

Cons

• Maintaining focus for 8 hours a day is difficult for younger children
• High school students will have less opportunities for jobs due to a later release time
• *** The big con*** Parents who work (don't they all???) will have to find day care for their child on Fridays. Many day cares will not accept a child just one day a week.
• Most students that receive free breakfast and lunches at school might go hungry
• Some parents won't be able to afford day care for one day and will leave children unattended before they are old enough to care for themselves. Care might fall to an older sibling and children will end up roaming the streets with nothing to do. (A bad situation).

The measure will allow individual school districts the choice on the number of days of instruction. Rural schools whose busses travel thousands of miles a day will benefit the most from the reduction in gas.

However, it will be hard for children to adjust to this type of a schedule and will leave many families scrambling to find care for their children.

This measure needs to be fully considered and will have severe backlash from communities.

What do you think?