Research on rural schools from Georgia State and Montana State comes up with a minor surprise:
Four-day school week can improve academic performance, study finds -- ScienceDaily
The researchers found a four-day school week had a statistically significant impact on math scores for fifth-grade students, while reading scores were not affected....So, kids do better in math and as well in reading, while the community saves money. Still, there are lots of legitimate issues among the four-day school week pros and cons - Google Search. But it's interesting.
"We thought that especially for the younger, elementary school kids, longer days on a shorter school week would hurt their academic performance because their attention spans are shorter. Also, a longer weekend would give them more opportunity to forget what they had learned."...
A number of school districts in the United States have moved from the traditional Monday through Friday schedule to a four-day week schedule as a cost-saving measure to reduce overhead and transportation costs. Four-day weeks have been in place for years in rural school districts in western states, particularly in Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming....
Walker notes the results are only applicable to smaller and more rural school districts.
