The four-day school week is becoming popular in dozens of countries in recent years. At least 1,600 schools in 24 US states already apply it and many others in Europe are experimenting with it. In this model, students have four slightly longer days but have one day off. Something similar to some workday programs that we have seen in Xataka. While a shorter week completely changes the traditional idea of education, what really drives it is concerns about saving and not so much how to improve performance.
The tendency. American schools have experimented with the four-day week since 1970, when gasoline prices soared and authorities sought to save on transportation and energy. In the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, another wave of schools adopted the practice to cope with shrinking budgets. Now, with another energy crisis looming and a shortage of teachers, the four-day school day is once again a viable solution around the world.
Not only the US has experimented with it. In Europe, France has made Wednesdays a day off in many schools (that was the day on which the Church taught catechism). In Germany, one of the Bundesländer, Saxony-Anhalt, will carry out an experiment in 12 secondary schools next year. On Fridays they will not open their doors and will replace classes with activities on-lineinternships in companies and extracurricular programming devised by each teacher.
Longer days, weekends too. The model that most schools follow basically consists of reducing the school week from Monday to Thursday, leaving Friday free, and adding 40 teaching minutes to each of those four days to compensate. According to recent surveys where students, parents and teachers were asked, the feedback is very positive. Attendance has increased and parents and students, given a choice, said they would support the four-day model, with 69% and 85% preferring it to the five-day model.
Some teachers explain in this Guardian article that they can do more as cuts in teaching, such as taking roll and moving between classrooms, are no longer a problem. They explain that the longest classes go to the laboratories, where they usually need more time. On the other hand, having a day off allows them to attend medical appointments or solve personal problems.
Why? Most schools that adopt the four-day week do so to save money and improve attendance rates and teacher availability, according to a 2021 study by the Rand Corporation, which includes data from several US states. However, the researchers conclude that the savings are minimal, generally no more than 3% of the total budget, although some directors say that small difference means a lot.
The academic impact. It remains unclear, in part because it is still very new and there has been a pandemic involved. Some researchers have found a short-term academic benefit, which could be due to teachers having more time to train, attend professional development workshops and prepare for classes. However, other studies suggest a learning loss as student performance at four-day schools “didn’t grow as fast” after moving to the new schedule as it did at five-day schools.
How to use that fifth day. There have been many critics of the education system who argue that it is ill-prepared for the challenges of today’s working life and that it lacks the tools to train students in important topics such as managing money, how to relate professionally or digital skills. Therefore, many believe that they can take advantage of that fifth day. In this way, some centers program the “free” day with activities that really stimulate students to undertake new forms of learning that are less supervised.
However, as the same study pointed out, 80% of students spent their “day off” at home and did not make much use of the time. And it also changed some sleep patterns: Students reported sleeping more. At least the students reported feeling much less tired than their counterparts in the five-day systems.
Image: GTRES