Washington declines four-day week, for now

WASHINGTON — All available members of the Washington school board voted against implementing a four-day school week in the 2025-26 school year at a meeting Tuesday night, but said they would reconsider the move in October, for a school year as early as 2026-27.

A sparse crowd gathered at the high school auditorium for the meeting, which was initially scheduled for Feb. 12, before winter weather forced a different meeting date. Board Member Jim Almelien was absent Tuesday night due to extenuating circumstances, as was board President Mike Liska, as other district officials said Tuesday was the date with the most board members available.

The vote followed months of deliberation as other districts around the state implement the schedule change in hopes of combating teacher shortages, as well as burnout among students and staff alike. The debate heated up especially in the last several weeks as decision day drew near, prompting surveys and roundtable discussions with community members.

“In 15 years, I’ve never talked to so many people about a given subject,” said longtime Board Member Troy Suchan. “One thing I’m pretty positive of is, this isn’t something we can do next school year … but I do believe that if we want to have great change, we have to make big changes.”

Board vows not to ‘kick can down the road’

While Tuesday night’s motion left the door open for another vote in October, decision-makers said they had no plans to deliberate indefinitely.

Rather, they framed the delay as a chance to gather more information, and answer important questions about day care solutions, food provisions and other issues, with certainty.

“In order for me to support a four-day week, we need to have concrete answers to some of these major questions that we’ve been asked by our constituents,” said Board Member Brendan DeLong. “Right now, correct me if I’m wrong, all we’ve got is, ‘We’re working on it.’ That’s not enough for me to support this, at this time.”

Others on the board agreed, saying they felt the last month and a half of deliberation felt rushed, cramming debate about food security and day care solutions into an already tense discussion on the merits of a four-day week itself.

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To that end, Superintendent Willie Stone said he’d maintain a steady flow of information as it became available. He plans to continue working with the local YMCA, food banks and other districts to solidify plans for day care, food insecurity and data review in the meantime.

“I will continue to try and get answers, and try to share what other districts are doing with you, what could work for us,” he said. “When we come to October, November, whatever day it is, you (will) have all the answers and can make that decision.”

But for now, district officials said they remained unsure about the four-day proposal.

Several agreed with Suchan that the district needed some kind of change to address student and staff burnout, whatever form that may take.

“I’m unsure if moving to a four-day school week will fix all of our issues,” said Board Member Diana Rich. “Are there other things we could be doing as a school district, or as a community? Have we exhausted all of our options? … I think change can be a great thing, but I’m not necessarily sure this change would be the right thing for our district.”

Public comments reject 4DSW, but survey responses split

Every community member who spoke during the Tuesday night meeting’s public comment period said they opposed four-day school weeks, several of them citing costs of day care, potential strain on students with disabilities, and a lack of food for families that depend on the schools for breakfast and lunch most days of the week.

Others claimed the four-day week would leave students ill-prepared for five-day schedules at most jobs when they reached adulthood, or framed the proposal as a Band-Aid solution that wouldn’t address other problems in schools like behavior issues.

“I think there’s things that could rectify the problem, instead of the nuclear option, going to the four-day week,” said Andrew Smith, one such public comment-maker.

School officials thanked the five people who spoke on the issue during public comments, but said they worried that feedback tending against four-day weeks was more vocal than feedback in favor, and not necessarily representative of district families writ large.

“I’m a firm believer that the ones that don’t want it are the ones that are going to reach out the most,” said DeLong, who added that most feedback he’d heard opposed the switch. “I think that we only hear from the ones that don’t want it, so I think there’s merit to discussing this in the future, because there’s a lot of people out there that do support it.”

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Survey responses last month showed 43.8% of students supported the four-day proposal, compared to 37.1% who opposed it. Also in favor were 36.9% of parents, compared to 31.7% against, and 33.2% of staff in approval versus 24.9% against. All others said they were undecided, or would “support either option.”

Survey takers who favored four-day weeks said they believed the schedule would keep schools sustainable, in terms of mental health.

“I think it will be great to support students’ and staff mental well-being,” said one parent, in an anonymized copy of survey responses obtained by The Union. “Being in education is challenging and they need a break. HS students can use that extra day to work. Teachers can use that extra day to lesson plan and clean and meet with grade levels.”

Hard data’s hard to find

Further clouding the debate over a four-day week is the lack of conclusive for or against it.

In Southeast Iowa, most of the districts switching to four-day school weeks have smaller student bodies. WACO was the first in the state to try the model, launching it about a decade ago. Highland and Winfield-Mt. Union, trying it for the first time this year, have enrollment counts of about 589 and 316, respectively.

While those neighboring districts offer compelling anecdotes in favor of the four-day model, the only district in Iowa close to Washington’s size on a four-day schedule is Saydel. The schools in rural Polk County implemented the model this year, and therefore have no data to report yet on its effects for student performance. That uncertainty gave Washington school officials pause.

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“I’m really concerned about how this effects our student learning,” said school board Vice President Mindi Rees. “Studies are out there in some of the other states that have done this for a while … in a nutshell, students that are in four-day weeks are learning at a slower pace than those in five-day weeks. And if that were to happen here, we certainly don’t want that.”

Academic literature on the matter leans slightly against four-day weeks from that perspective, although many studies are inconclusive, and some advocates argue the impact of student and staff mental health outweighs any potential risk to grades.

A 2023 study in Oregon from Early Child Research Quarterly on the matter found “minimal and non-significant differences” in student achievement among pupils who attended four-day versus five-day school weeks from kindergarten through third grade, but noted that among those who scored highest on math and language arts assessments in preschool, four-day students scored slightly worse than their equally high-performing peers following five-day weeks. The study found no such discrepancy for students who performed at or below average in preschool.

Another 2021 Study from the RAND Corporation found that “student achievement did not grow as fast” in four-day school week districts as in comparable 5-day ones, based on national assessment scores.

That’s made it an especially tough issue to decide on for school board members.

“I can talk to somebody who wants us to do this and I totally get what they’re saying, and then I talk to somebody else who does not want us to do it, and I can totally support where they’re coming from,” said Board Member Kara Williams. “So sitting in the middle is very difficult, especially when they say, ‘I hope you make the right decision.’”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com