Maybe Having a Full Week of School is Not so Bad
Nojhat Miah
January 20, 2022A full length of school can have its pros and cons because if we have a full day of school it seems students will have enough time to learn and understand a lesson but it's not the same for all students. Some have a hard time sitting through a class without getting distracted or tired so having a shorter school day doesn’t seem bad. Also having shorter school days students can have time to do stuff they want to do after school because with transportation, homework, and clubs students don’t have time to do what they like after school because they’re so busy. In George Washington Carver students were asked around if we should have shorter school days or a week of school.
Syncere Thomas, 9th grader at Carver, believes we should have shorter school days. Have four days of school and a 3-day weekend. He thinks having a 3-day weekend would be more beneficial and help students to have a better understanding of the lessons they learn.
“There should be 4-day week with a 3-day weekend to improve student functionality” Syncere said, “There may be a speed up in instructions, but the extended weekly weekend will help the information learned through a school-day sink in since kids and teenagers are like sponges when it comes to learning new things.”
Hakim Woods, a 9th grader at Carver, actually thinks the opposite of Syncere and thinks we should keep to having 5 days of school because he believes 45 minutes in each class is not enough time to understand or ask for help in something so shortening the school days would not be much of a help.
“No, because 45 minutes in classes are not even enough for some students to learn things” Hakim said, “For example in biology 45 minutes isn’t enough. It's been a week and I barely understand the topic we learned so I feel like the length of school is just fine.”
Having shorter days also has its cons to it. If we change it to having shorter school days not only does the school's schedule change but so does the families schedule. Some families like to match up their schedules or some parents like to put their kids in daycare. The article, Shortened school days would not help children learn stated that “Many working parents have the family schedules worked out carefully, changes in school timings would mean new problems about picking up children on time, or children staying home for extended hours without a parent present.”
Not only can it change up schedules but parents believe with shorter school days students will be missing parts of the education and will be having to do summer school or private lessons over the summer which kids obviously want to enjoy their summer and not have to worry about school. One parent shared, “Our children could end up losing large amounts of classroom learning - and then they would need even more private lessons to close the education gap.”
Sofia, a 12th grader at Carver, also thinks that we shouldn’t shorten the school days. Sofia thinks the time for each class is enough time to learn and if the school days were shorter than the teachers would most likely would have to abbreviate the lessons.
“Plus each period is just the right amount of time to get adequate instructions in” Sofia said, “If the school days were shortened I think it would affect the education because there probably wouldn’t be enough time for full lessons and the teacher would probably have to abbreviate things.”
Dr. Johnson, the principal at Carver, believes 5 days of school is just right for the students. He also thinks how the schedules of each day were organized is good for the students to have enough time to learn but also have breaks during the day.
“Most of the students here, they're in each one of their classes for 45 to 50 minutes. But then they also have a space to catch up or work, build relationships, check with a teacher during your advisory time” Dr. Johnson said, “and then you have lunch time for them to eat, check in with their friends and connect with their peers. I think that the school day looks pretty good the way that it's set up.”