Blackfoot should have Fridays off

I don’t know about you, but I have always been jealous of Snake River, Bingham Academy, Firth, and several other schools getting Fridays off. Taking Fridays off could give Blackfoot several benefits and should be considered. Bussing is a considerable expense in our area because we live in a rural area. If we cut the week to four days, busses would run for fewer days saving a significant amount of money.  We could also save on custodial pay, heating, food costs and utility bills. After taking Fridays off a district in Peach County Georgia was able to reduce substitute costs by 76 percent and transportation costs by 35 percent. Our school clearly needs more money for new textbooks and other things such as a new track and this is a way to provide that money.   

Attendance would rise significantly if we took Fridays off. Students and staff would be able to schedule business and medical appointments for Friday and  therefore not miss school earlier in the week. Athletes attendance would especially benefit from having Fridays off because they won’t have to miss Friday’s for tournaments on their traveling teams. Athletes on the school teams would also benefit because when they have games on Friday they won’t miss classes.  

According to a study done by  Montana State University which studied schools in colorado there are academic benefits to taking Fridays off.  “Our results suggest that student academic achievement has not been hurt by the change in schedule. Instead, the evidence indicates that the adoption a four-day school week shares a positive and often statistically significant relationship with performance in both reading and mathematics.”

Having Fridays off will also help to reduce stress in students and teachers. With an extra day off teachers will have extra time to prepare lessons, collaborate with other teachers, and go to teaching seminars. Students will have more time to finish projects and feel more inclined to join extracurricular activities because they will have enough time to do those activities. In the same district in Georgia, they experienced 40 percent less disciplinary issues which they attributed to the students being less stressed. 

Because taking Fridays off could have lots of benefits such as more money, better attendance, and calmer students Blackfoot should consider a schedule without Fridays.