The alarm rings again at 5:30 a.m. just like the past four days. Although junior Hydee Hall has slept, she doesn’t feel well rested because her homework and her after school activities have prevented her from getting a good night’s sleep for four days in a row. Although this has been the norm for many years, it doesn’t have to be. Over 900 school districts have transitioned to a four day school week. Some benefits of this are more free time for students and better attendance.

The idea of a four day school week is exciting for a lot of students. Halls says, “I would love to not come to school Friday.”

Misty Adams, a principal here at AHS, has a different view; she says, “ I personally do not think it’s the right fit for Anderson High School.”

Hall who does multiple after-school programs such as marching band, interact, and student council likes this idea. “I would like more free time,” she says. Aside from the after school activities she also takes classes that have a lot of homework. “I have so much homework. I might even say too much homework.” As for what she would do on the extra day she has big plans. “Probably like the same thing I do on the weekend so like sleep.” However a concern of a four day school week is what if parents can’t provide child care on that extra day. While this isn’t as big of a concern for high schools it might become a problem if elementary schools adopt the schedule.

Adams agrees, “Child care is also a challenge for families in younger grades. While there may be benefits, these factors make me hesitant to support the change.”

The other benefit is attendance, which is a concern here at AHS, Misty Adams says, “Anderson High School’s attendance has lots of room for improvement.” Research and Development (RAND) reports an increase in attendance for schools that have a four day week. School weeks are too long which causes attendance to go down.

Hall says, “I definitely feel like I don’t wanna come more as the week goes on like by Friday I have no motivation.”

Adams backs this up with numbers, “Not surprisingly, attendance issues rise as the week goes on. For example, on Monday, 11/17, there were 777 unexcused absences and by Friday, 11/21, the number rose to 1,253.” This shows that due to the length of the week our attendance goes down, which would be less of a problem if we only had four days.

Along with the issue of child care some people have other concerns. Adams says, “ Extending the school day could increase behavior issues, and many of our students rely on school for meals, so they’d miss an extra day of breakfast and lunch.” However there could be easy fixes for both of these. The behavior seems to be an issue no matter if there are longer days or more days. We could also still give out extra school lunches on Thursday for the students who need it.

So it shouldn’t be that large of a problem and it would benefit the students. So the question really is, why not?