Depending on the outcome of a school board vote next week, West Glacier Elementary's 24 students may have Fridays off beginning next fall.
West Glacier is considering joining scores of schools across the nation that have, in recent years, moved to a four-day week. Proponents say the schedule provides families and schools more flexibility, reduces absences and may save districts money.
About 100 schools across the United States operate on a four-day schedule.
One-fifth of those are in Montana - primarily in small, rural districts such as West Glacier. They tend to have low student populations and parents who are able to be home on Fridays, thus preventing overloaded day cares or an abundance of latch-key kids.
Several school districts in Montana switched to four-day weeks after the state Legislature changed how long schools have to be in session each year.
For years, schools had to provide 180 instructional days each year. In 2005, new legislation passed requiring instead a certain number of annual instructional hours: 720 hours for kindergarten through third-grade students and 1,080 hours for fourth- through 12th-graders.
When that change took place, 'schools started to get creative and more flexible in how they deliver education," state Superintendent of Schools Denise Juneau said.
Rural schools in particular embraced more flexible schedules, she said.
Many of their students who participated in extracurricular activities missed school - sometimes all day - on Fridays to travel to competition. Small budgets in rural districts made it prudent to consider more energy-efficient schedules. Districts could save a little money if staff members were at school fewer days.
About 20 Montana districts operate on a four-day or otherwise "alternative" schedule. Arlee will join the ranks next fall; its school board recently voted to move to a four-day week.
Helmville School, a 26-student K-8 district about 25 miles northeast of Drummond, has operated on an alternative schedule for nearly three years.
The district hesitates to call it a four-day week, head teacher Susan Graveley said. Instead it prefers to leave flexibility in its schedule to allow for unforeseen closures - such as when a broken water pump shut the school down for a day in March - or to prevent four-day weekends when students are out of school for Monday holidays.
A few years ago, the school would be nearly empty on Fridays when students wanted to watch their older siblings in extracurricular activities at Drummond High School, Graveley said. Often staff members wanted to go to games, too.
"We would have a skeleton crew at school," Graveley said, adding that the large number of absent students made teachers hesitant to introduce new material, or even review old lessons, on Fridays.
The school was in a bit of a bind. It encouraged families to spend time together, and it wanted families to feel connected to the high school, Graveley said. Helmville needed a different option so its students wouldn't suffer academically.
Even so, Graveley, who has more than 30 years' teaching experience, said she initially was hesitant about the alternative schedule.
"I asked, 'If I think it's going south, or if it's not working well, or if the kids need the extra day - if it doesn't feel right, could we go back?'" she said.
The school board agreed, and trustees and teachers paid close attention to students' performance. They met monthly to discuss how the new schedule was working.
"It took me three months to say, 'We're doing fine,'" Graveley said. And three years later, the situation still is fine, she added.
Little research exists on the four-day week's impact on academic achievement. At a recent community meeting, West Glacier Principal Cortni King cited data from the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory that suggests four-day weeks neither positively nor negatively affect student performance.
Jennifer Klump, education resource adviser for the Portland-based nonprofit, said she has seen four evaluations of the four-day week. None of them are recent and none are conclusive. The Colorado Department of Education conducts annual updates on its four-day districts, but that information is more anecdotal than based on hard data, Klump said.
In Helmville, the four-day week hasn't seemed to impact students' performances, Graveley said.
"We have had none of them slide back or stop in growth," she said. "We haven't seen any effect. That's one of the things we really watched."
Families have embraced the alternative schedule, she said. After the first year, the school asked families and seventh- and eighth-graders what they thought of the four-day week and whether they wanted to keep that schedule.
"We had 100 percent wanted to do it again," Graveley said.
Ovando School, a K-8 district about 15 miles north of Helmville, has met with similar success, head teacher Leigh Ann Valiton said.
"The four-day school week has worked out real well for us," she said.
Ovando had problems similar to Helmville, with several absences on Fridays, Valiton said. The new schedule, which was implemented two years ago, has alleviated that problem.
The four-day week also has given families more time with their children, something Valiton said is very important in their community.
"The parents right now absolutely love it," she said. "This gives them more opportunities to do what is the basis of community."
The community is an important factor for any district considering moving to a four-day week, Graveley said.
"The four-day week works for us. I would never say to anybody else, 'It'd work for you, too,'" she said. "I think it's really important that it be a community decision, based on their stories."
West Glacier hopes to hear more stories from its community at a public meeting at the school at 5:30 p.m. Thursday. The school board will vote on the four-day week proposal at its regular meeting April 21.
For further information, contact the school at 888-5312.
Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or by e-mail at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com
luckygirl
The US lags behind most other (if not all) developed nations academically. Let's give the kids another day off, what the heck. Who needs education when you have sports...duh.
faithful reader
What luckygirl said. How could anyone expect children to learn as much with a fifth of their education days eliminated? Either the school is committed to education or it isn't.
momof4
As a parent, I was always shocked by the amount of material that was not completed in my children's workbooks at the end of each year. They obviously did not have time to get through all of the material. I do not understand why this happens. Our future generations will only know as much as we allow them to learn... School is their job, sports come second. Maybe Fridays could be "bring your parent to school day" instead of a day off if parents want to spend more time with their children. A three day weekend is only going to facilitate increased ignorance in this country. Educators should be striving to better the children's test scores, not be content with status quo.
JT
What schools need is to start expecting and requiring more out of their students. We have this concept of pandering to the least attentive and dedicated of our students, which slows the pace of education drastically. I home schooled for 1 year of my high school education. I was easily done with lessons by noon if I applied myself and could have a week's material finished by wednesday without much effort. However, if I coasted along not paying attention or procrastinating, it would take me so much more time. I know it goes against the grain of "modern" educational models, but if those models worked we wouldn't be doing worse every year despite increased federal and state spending. Condense the lesson times and require students to focus. Provide tutors for the ones who cannot keep up on the fridays and let the rest of the kids have some fun before they are stuck in a 9-5 grind for their adult life. Bet you a shiny penny if students knew they could have an extra day off a week if they applied themselves you'd blow the top off exit exam scores. Doh there I go actually expecting people to work hard
momof4
Very well put, JT. I agree completely. The lax attitude adopted by many students and teachers is the reason I decided to start home-schooling my children. They too finish their lessons quickly and accurately when they apply themselves. They know they will be rewarded with the afternoon off if they finish their work correctly. They certainly have shown that as I have raised the bar on what is expected of them, they have consistently met or exceeded these expectations. There is no reason to believe most other children out there couldn't do the same.
campo
Please don't bring in the "I homeschool because the school system is lousy" routine. My wife taught high school English. She never saw a previously home-schooled kid come in her class prepared for what was going to be happening during the school year. There is a reason teachers go to COLLEGE to learn to become teachers. You want to make our schools better? Stop educating the "masses"!! Face it, not all kids are going to go on to higher learning. That is the part other "developed nations" have figured out. The ones that can't or will not cut it in a classroom are sent down different paths. This valley had a perfect opportunity to do something good and blew it. Instead of building Glacier High, they should have built a new Vo-tech school and taught the non-collegiate kids a good trade.
momof4
Excuse me, campo. Why is then that 80 percent of home-schooled children in grades k-12 have higher standardized test scores than the national average? And how do you know what kind of education I have and whether or not I am qualified to teach my children? I know there are some parents who use home-schooling as an excuse for their children to be truant, and maybe your wife had the unfortunate experience of dealing with some of those children. My post was not to brag about what I am doing with my children, it was just to point out that when most children are pushed to achieve more they will comply happily; especially if there is an incentive. Instead, it seems like mediocrity is acceptable these days.
JT
Home schooled kids never stack up...really??? I rejoined high school, tested out of my year's math and was put in calculus. Went on to college, aced entrance exams, lectured 300 level college classes and finished my masters at 23. You sir are wrong. Remove expectations and incentives and you will be assured mediocrity. Oh and I was asked to be a tutor in college english because my writing skills were well ahead of that level and so many publicly educated students needed assistance. I am not a special case. Having good parents who valued learning and instilled in me a work ethic was perhaps the single greatest influence in my outcome. Stay involved in your kid's lives and education. And for crying out loud stop apologizing for them and diagnosing them with ADD. Show your kids you care enough about them to expect them to do well and then invest your energy and time to that end. I promise you'll like the result. As an added bonus they won't be living in your basement when they are 30.
1balddude
JT, you need to be on the school board. That's the thinking and the attitude that we all need. I am constantly amazed at how many days off students already have off. Campo, school is a tool to ready our children for the work place, not just cushy teaching jobs, but a place where you must work for 40+ hours a week. Vo-tech is very good and starts kids in a good direction and we need more of that, less work hours, we don't need. Hard work and dedication is what needs to be instilled in our children
campo
momof4, You are proving my point, you can't even read and comprehend or extrapolate the inferences I just made!! If I could handpick students from a school system and put them up against all you brilliant hometeachers I guarantee your stats would not be so lopsided. You sure seem to throw out a lot of stats on this blog. Statistics can be twisted in just about any direction you want them to be. All those subpar students with parents with such low expectations wouldn't be in there. Because we do exactly what JT said we did in his first post, pander to the weak. Educating the masses, that is the problem. And JT don't get your knickers in a twist, you are not the norm and you know it, so get off your high horse. Here is my own stat. 4 years of college at MSU, which included a year stint as an RA. Into 4 more years of graduate doctoral education in the midwest, and I never met one single home-schooled person. They all must have tested right out of everything, yes? How do you get in on those graduate level homeschool classes?