Read this article http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/03/education/school-districts-in-5-states-will-lengthen-their-calendars.html and do other research if necessary.  Craft a well-written response about whether adding time to the school year will improve learning, test scores, and/or student life.
Brad Hall
12/10/2012 03:11:44 am

I dont think we should have longer school days, but what i think we should have is school later in the day like starting at mabye around noon and getting out at seven so we still get the same amount of time but because its later in the day students will be more well rested and be more focused for the school day. This could help get over that first hour feeling most everyone gets it will give more time for students to wake up and get ready.

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Jacob Kane
12/10/2012 03:13:02 am

I do not think that adding more days to school would be a good idea, because some kids already hate being there and slack-off to much already and all that it would do is make them angry. It also would not, in my opinion, be a good way to spend money. Why not instead of spending all this money to pay for more paper, pay for more food, pay teachers longer, they just use the money to enrich the normal amount of school days. Buy better computers, get more learning devices, just my opinion.

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Ryan Carlson
12/10/2012 03:16:38 am

I can see how people believe extending a schools number of hours or days can effectively change students test scores and opportunities but not if a major problem doesn't change. Ways of teaching students and children need to be enhanced and improved. Sitting and simply listing to a teacher will only destroy any student’s hope of a path to learning. Over my career of education I've had plenty of classes where in which I simply sat and gained no educational value. School districts first must realize that this is the proper way of growing the minds of young adults that will lead business, communities, and nations; then I’ll agree that longer days and hours need to be added.

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Lane Merrill
12/10/2012 03:19:52 am

I think it is a bad idea to extend the school schedule. First of all for those who work after school would be out of work because of the extended school day. Although it would probobly be benefitial to your edjucation, it would not be good for morale and alot of students would be very unhappy about it.

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Stephen Bowles
12/10/2012 03:21:09 am

Adding time may very well help students all over the board, both those who are under-performing and those who are excelling. The added time would allow students who struggle to learn a topic over a greater stretch of time rather than trying to squeeze it in while trying to meet standards. Students who excell would benefit because they would be able to go more in-depth on topics of interest, or study a wider ange of topics than they would in a normal school year. That being said, it is important to understand that time alone is not enough to increase performance. The students have to care.

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Ryker Cowles
12/10/2012 03:29:02 am

If the school started later in the day (like around 9-10am) we woundent be having these issues as much and then we woundent be wasting money on schools to stay open longer then rather just having the same amount of school but start it a later time to let student be rested instead of tired which making school longer will not help student be more rested, yet rather the opposite.

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Richelle Bell
12/10/2012 03:38:47 am

I think that it wouldn’t make a difference if the days were longer, because if a kid doesn’t want to learn about something then they won’t, it doesn’t matter how long you make them sit there, if they aren’t going to put the effort forward to do the work then why try? Some kids may want to learn stuff but it doesn’t take a longer year to do it. You really want to help the kids? Spend all that cash that you’re going to waste on more school and buy NEW BOOKS that’s what is needed. If there were up to date books then kids might learn a little faster. One of the books I had in a class once had a pitcher of someone lessoning to an old Walkman… that is OLD. Not even a C.D. player a Walkman. So I don’t agree with the longer year. But I guess I am just lucky I’m graduating this year.

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Caleb
12/10/2012 03:59:05 am

I think that a longer school year would be great if we had a lot more breaks in between. Studies show that students do better in schools with a longer work year. They don’t have the long summer to forget about everything.

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Levi Brinkman
12/10/2012 04:01:09 am

I think they shouldn't make the school day longer. The kids that don't like school are more likely to drop out. The kids that like school probably do well already so more time wouldn't make too much of a difference.

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amanda loughry
12/11/2012 03:17:25 am

I think that they shouldn't make the school day longer, or the school year longer by alot. I believe that we go long enough during the day and have a long enough school year. I think that if they were to change something about the school day they should change the school hours to start around 8:30-9:00am and get out 3:30-4:00pm, and then maybe extend the school year a week or so. Student's would just get fed-up with having to go to school and would just slack even more at the end of the year. I do not think this would improve grade scores.

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Drew Engle
12/11/2012 03:53:49 am

When schools across America decide to make this change, I can see a positive and negative outcome. The positive outcome would be that the average student can gain extra time on an assignment that they didn’t understand or finish in class. Also the teachers would have more time on each subject, thus being able to explain the subjects with more worksheets for a better understanding for the student. A negative outcome would be that the lower grade student wouldn’t appreciate this opportunity and see it as just more school. This could lead to more high school dropouts.

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Connor Hays
12/12/2012 03:11:30 am

I think instead of just extending the year or day lengths, we could at least try out year round school. I was intially completely opposed to this idea but it actually makes sense, you still get all of christmas break, spring break, and all the time off over summer but it's drawn out, so like every four weeks or so you get like 1-2 weeks off school but your also not out of school long enough to forget everything.

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Travis Miller
12/12/2012 03:56:57 am

I do not think that adding more school days and hours is a good idea. Kids have enough problems paying attention as it is now i cant imagine what they would be like if we added more hours onto school. So i think they should leave the days as they are.

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Mackenzie Monroe
12/12/2012 03:59:45 am

I believe that lengthened school days/years will help if the school's students have low scores overall. I think that if it needs to be done to get through to these students, it should be done. I see that the schools that are lengthening their hours are big schools with 20,000 students enrolled, and that is probably a big part of it. These students aren't getting the one-on-one help they would get if there were less students enrolled. More time with teachers will help the students at these schools.

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Raven Gaiski
12/13/2012 03:22:18 am

I do not like the idea of longer school days and school years. I don't like this idea because a lot of high schoolers have jobs already and after school, they will go to work. Once they get out of work, they have to do their homework. This leaves very little time to spend time with your family and do all the fun things that you like to do in your spare time. If school days were to be expanded, this will take away even more time, and we already go to school for 8 hours a day, and I believe 8 hours a day is enough. I also don't think its a good idea to expand the year itself because it will cause a lot of people to complain. we go to school 9 months out of the year and again, I think everyone should get a little break, so 3 months of summer vacation would be smart to keep, and not expand the school year and days.

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Austin Jordan
12/14/2012 03:09:29 am

In my opinion the idea of a longer school year is a bad idea up to a point. What I mean by this is that while I would not enjoy it, a year round school year is the most practical and helpful option.

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Lucas Johnson
12/14/2012 03:11:36 am

I do not think that increasing the time we spend in school would help underperforming students. I think in order to help out underperforming students more attention should be given to them. Such as figuring out why they are not doing so good. Also I think if students want to take extra classes they should be able to take them during the summer. It would be like a summer school for EC classes. Keeping me in school longer would not do me very well. I need time to gets things done; I need time to live my life. I think this is just another way of parents trying to solve their problems without blaming themselves. Most of the time it’s the parent’s fault, so figure out what you did wrong and try to fix.

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Donavin Taggart
12/14/2012 03:38:45 am

I think that a longer school year would be a bad idea because there would be no time for a summer vacation and it would most likely cause a higher dropout rate for students.

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