Colorado recently announced a 4-day school week that has been in effect for the past month. They believe that the shortened week will cut costs by $1 million in the first year. Other states are starting to implement the same schedule as Wyoming, Florida, Montana, Oklahoma, and Oregon.  

By not operating classes on Mondays, the school district will only have to pay for school bus services and substitute teachers for four days a week instead of five. In April of 2018, thousands of teachers walked out of their classrooms in protest of low wages and low school funding. By providing a change to the schedule, the school districts of Colorado, especially the rural areas, believe that they won’t be losing as many teachers due to the extra day off. 

In addition to the adoption of the new four day week, the district plans to provide all-day child care services on Monday’s for $30 a day per student to help parents that work on Mondays in the process. Child care will run from 6:00 am-6:00 pm allowing for a full day care.  

The schools plan on extending class time an extra 40 min from Tuesday-Friday. Elementary students and full day kindergartners will begin at 7:50 am-3:30 pm. Whilst middle and high students will start at 8:30 am-4:32 pm. The trend keeps on aspiring other states to do the same. 

Currently, 560 districts in 25 states have schools on four-day schedules. Studies show that some advantages to the four-day week implementation are fewer student absences since parents and guardians can schedule appointments for students on their day off. Some disadvantages are the students of low-income families depend on school breakfast and lunch for their meals.  

Because of the change, Colorado and other states hope to maintain a good standing in education with beliefs that the four-day weeks will allow for a healthier school life. By changing the school week schedule, the students of rural area districts and other surrounding districts will be able to get extra homework/studying done, keep up with extracurricular activities, and most importantly higher tests scores/good grades.