Why some U.S. school districts are adopting a 4-day school week

Author: Scotty Hendricks / Source: Big Think

Many people have talked about the four-day workweek recently. Test runs of the idea have been carried out in Sweden, and Australian politicians have openly discussed the notion. The current system of a five-day work week and two days off is well entrenched though.

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Beyond work, we also shape our social lives and educational system around this model.

However, many school districts have been experimenting with different ideas. The year-round model, where summer vacation is ended in favor of a few shorter breaks peppered through the year, is well known. Less well known, but quite widespread, is the four-day week model used in school districts across 25 states.

A four-day school week

Most schools are required to have students attend for a preset number of hours, not days. In the state of Colorado, where the four-day school week is most popular, students in all school districts go to school for 1080 hours a year. However, many districts choose to arrange this in four, longer days each week rather than in five typical days. The net result is the same amount of school time packed into 144 days each year rather than 180.

While Colorado schools that operate for less than 160 days a year require approval for these schedules, more than one hundred school districts have been approved to do so in all parts of the state.

Why do they do this? How did they come up with the idea?

Schools in Colorado have been experimenting with the shorter week since 1980. The primary motivation for the changes are financial, shorter weeks offer many savings, but many districts also point to a desire for more time for family activities and teacher preparation as reasons for the switch.

While some sources suggest that a few South Dakota schools tried a shorter week in the 1930’s, the recent movement for a shorter school week goes back to the gas crisis. The high cost of fuel in the late 70’s and early 1980’s inspired cost-saving experiments all across the country. While most school districts went back to the five-day week as costs went down, some districts never did.