Four-Day School Weeks: Pros and Cons - Essay Sample

Introduction

Early rising has often been a significant challenge experienced by not only the young kids but also the secondary school students. They often feel worn out, especially after the weekend festivities. However, four-day-school weeks has been adopted by policymakers to reduce the secondary school roaring budgets as well as the boredom experienced by the students and the young school-going kids. However, the adoption of the four-day-school weeks has faced several controversies among the parents, teachers, as well as the school-going children (Chmelynski 68). In my opinion, changing to four-day secondary school week by policymakers would not be beneficial because of several reasons

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For instance, the four-day- school week hinders the quality of education for the young students, lowers academic performance as well as disrupting the lives of the school staff and faculty. In the United States of America, many states are embracing the transition from five days of school per week to four (Durr 21). This has been orchestrated majorly by the eminent economic challenges that are experienced across the various states in the US. With the four-days a week program, students attend lessons from Tuesday through to Friday, unlike the traditional program where students stayed in school from Monday to Friday (Chmelynski 50). Each day lasts for approximately ninety minutes longer to cover up for the one day lost. The prolonged duration of tuition to cover for the lost time on Monday is seriously detrimental to the quality of education because the student's concentration span is limited and could be negatively affected by the prolonged contact time.

Research indicates the four-day school weeks would primarily result in wearing down of the young students such that their concentration would be too low to grasp quality education. Even though the older students can handle the longer school days, the four-days per week program could negatively affect the student's participation in extra-curriculum activities (Durr 2). With such extended school days, most students would be so much exhausted that they would not have the energy to participate in the after-school activities. The extracurricular activities are essential as far as promoting the happiness and success of the older students is concerned (Chmelynski 6). The four-day school week eliminates the fun associated with extra-curriculum activities.

Moreover, the four-days a week program significantly affects the lives of the school students by placing unnecessary stress on them if they are absent from school. Even though absenteeism is disregarded in school, there are specific genuine reasons that could not be overlooked. For instance, a student may be absent from school due to sickness in one of the four days. This would pose a significant challenge to the students because they would have missed a bulk of the material in one day. Subsequently, the student may have limited turnaround time to make up for time lost because the homework time would have been cut off by the prolonged school day (Chmelynski 68).

Even though several challenges characterize a four-day school week, some education officials across the state argue that it would be the most appropriate means of ensuring the economic sustainability of various schools through cutting off on the districts' educational budget. It is a fact that the transportation cost would reduce through the adoption of the four-day school week program. However, the teachers' salaries are not affected by the shift in the education program. Therefore, it is not justifiable to interfere with the general daily schedules of the school only for small saving such as those associated with transportation costs of the students to and from school.

Furthermore, various researches indicate that it is not only the students that are negatively affected by the four-day school week program but teachers and other employees of the secondary schools as well (Durr 5). For instance, the workers within the school find themselves without jobs one extra day of the week. This consequently results in the workers losing their wages for the extra day. If this challenge is not well addressed, employees with unstable sources of income may leave the schools for other jobs (Chmelynski 8). As such, there would be a resultant complication in the secondary and primary schools, especially when it comes to staffing because it would be confusing to staff employees who are balancing between two jobs (Kingsbury 49).

Again, the employees within the schools who are often unable to cope with the long hours of work a day may be forced to quit the job, which is less strenuous when it comes to hours of work. Moreover, when the employees are severely affected, the four-day school week plan may have resultant negative consequences on both the national economic scales as well as the individual schools (Durr 20). Teachers are also affected as they feel burdened by switching from the usual five-day school week to four-day school week.

Even though they are working one day less, Tuesday to Friday is mentally exhausting mainly because of the long hours of work per day. The most challenging and tiresome side for the teachers is that the additional time does not include the creation of mandatory lesson plans and attending professional meetings (Kingsbury 49) The teachers have to create their own time out of the already fixed schedules to attend to other personal and professional callings. Tired teachers cannot be expected to offer quality teaching services to the learners

Concisely, the four-day school week does affect not only the students but also their teachers. The teachers of these schools have to fight for the attention of the exhausted students. It is indeed challenging for tired teachers to be teaching bored students and expect quality education (Durr 18). However, even if the students may not be exhausted, most of the teachers find it hard to fix a five-days of instructions into four days. Trying to cram five days' work into four days in most cases, leave the learners overwhelmed.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the negative consequences of adaption to the four-day school week outweigh the positive outcomes. As a result, it would be unwise to disrupt the traditionally accepted and viable five-day school week for the entire district. Even though the economy requires serious cutting on operational costs, it must not necessarily come from education through the implementation of the four-day school week. The four-day school policy seems like a desperate approach to lowering costs and not geared towards improved quality of education in the United States. Various policymakers within the US ought to look for other avenues of stimulation of the local budget without negatively affecting the school systems. Concisely, the four-day school week seems impractical and creates more problems than solutions, as well as contradicting the teachings and beliefs of various individuals who encourage quality education across the United States.

Works Cited

Chmelynski, Carol. "Four-day school weeks? Only if they fit." The Education Digest 68.5 (2003): 58. Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/openview/12bf2224c1e07a9ce36f24ebc3e2d544/1.pdf?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=25066

Durr, Greta. "Four-day school week?." State Legislatures 29.5 (2003): 21-21.

Kingsbury, Kathleen. "Four-day school weeks." Time magazine 172.8 (2008): 49-50.