Schools all over Texas have been converting to a 4-day school week. This sparks debates over how the decisions impact students, parents, and school faculty.

I’m against the implementation of 4-day school weeks. 4-day school weeks, according to studies, have been detrimental to academic performance. “These bigger cuts seem to be happening in non-rural areas that haven’t thought through all the details of implementation — they may be moving to four-day school for short-term reasons, like cost savings,” says lead study author Paul Thompson, a professor in OSU’S College of Liberal Arts.

Another reason I believe that 4-day school weeks will have negative effects is that children who rely on the school to provide them with nutrients will now receive fewer meals. Many households for many reasons are unable to feed their children regularly, and adding another day to the fact will only harm the child.

The main reason for the implementation of 4-day school weeks is because of the shortage of teachers. Teachers have been leaving the profession at an alarming rate because of the unsatisfactory income and heavy workloads. The 4-day school week is meant to lighten their workload while trying to make their income fair. This simply doesn’t work because the required time a school has to run won’t change, therefore, teachers will spend the same amount of time with practically the same amount of work. One solution to this problem would be to target the core of the issue, funding, for a very long time the educational system has been underfunded and neglected. While the entertainment and sports industries thrive, the academic industry hangs on by a thread.

The recent conversion to 4-day school weeks should be recalled by the school boards and there are many ways to fix the issues we deal with now. People should call for more funding for education and less attention to useless businesses. Instead of poking around the bushes, we should target the heart of the conflict, and only then will we truly fix our problems.