VIRGINIA- After surveying district patrons about a possible switch to a four-day school week for 2025-26, ISD 2142 Superintendent Reggie Engebritson recommended to the school board on Tuesday that they keep the current schedule for next year while keeping the option on the table for the future.
Engebritson said that the findings from the 1,151 responses the district received for the survey largely favored the switch to a four-day week. Forty-eight percent of respondents, and 47 percent of parents, were strongly in favor of the change, while another 16 percent, and 15 percent of parents, were somewhat in support.
The biggest concerns registered by respondents included a lack of child care options for Fridays when school would not be in session, the longer school day to accommodate required instructional time, long bus rides, and no transportation for athletes for Friday practices.
Of even greater concern were the number of parents, 111, who said they would consider leaving the district if the switch was made to a four-day week.
“That would involve possibly 209 kids, and at $10,000 a student that would be over $2 million that would leave the district,” Engebritson said.
The projected amount of funding lost would be nearly four times the amount of money the district anticipated saving by making the change, about $527,000.
“I realize these are just people considering this so it’s not for sure,” Engebritson said. “And if we did this, the number of people who might open enroll (and come to the district) might offset those numbers. But I just want to give you what it looks like now.”
Given the questions and concerns, Engebritson suggested that the best course of action at the moment would be to take more time to investigate the four-day option.
“The thought is that maybe we pause on this for a year,” she said. “We see that there’s support. We want to acknowledge that parents want this, but then take some time to focus on how we would create a school-age (child care) program on Fridays. There are different pots of monies that we could use to fund that, whether it’s Indian Ed money for kids who are Native Americans, some early childhood money, some compensatory money, some Title VII money to create a program that maybe would be some enrichment and remediation for kids on Fridays, plus that child care piece. My recommendation is that we keep talking about it. I need to respond to the staff and to the community to say the survey results came in support, but I feel that we need to still keep looking at it but probably not put it in place next fall.”
The recommendation got immediate support from board chairman Lynn Hilde.
“I personally think that’s a good idea to continue to look at it for the future,” he said. “Aren’t Wrenshall and Carlton looking at it?”
Board member Chris Koivisto also voiced his support for the move.
“I have a split household. My wife is adamantly opposed, and I support it, so I have these conversations at the dinner table. I can see that it takes a little bit more discussion. It does take some time to figure out what it would really look like. Right now, it’s just a four-day week. We don’t have anything fleshed out at all, and that’s tough timing-wise. So, I’ll support kicking it down the road and that the polling says that people support it in general. Therefore, we will go into some planning and investigate what it might look like and make it a bigger plan.”
Board member Bob Larson, however, voiced his opposition to the change.
“As I’ve said before, I certainly indicated that I’m against it, with the idea of children losing one-fifth of their education,” he said. “I understand we lengthen our days, but is it the same? What I’ve been trying to do is to Google it to see what are the good things, what are the benefits, and they talk about some of the benefits coming out of it. I still have my concern about elementary kids losing something by losing a fifth day, but I think we can look also as to the benefits that can come out of this.”
Engebritson noted that with the district’s current schedule that includes a shorter instructional day on Wednesdays, they already have a four-and-a-half-day week.
Engebritson noted that the district would also benefit from knowing more about what other districts are planning.
“I do meet regionally with some of the superintendents in the area,” she said. “We have a meeting next Wednesday to see where other districts are at. I’m not exactly sure if any other district might be ready to go next year. It’s possible, but I’ll know more next Wednesday.”