Persuasive 4 day week
Dear Prosper school board I write this letter to you on the proposal of a four day school week, my name is Alex Wells and I am in grade 12. I have taken in all the potential factor not only for students but for parents and teachers, looking at both the pros and cons. I respectfully ask that the board keep my letter in mind when making the decision and to also remember their own responsibilities.
At first a four day week may sound very appealing and most will quickly believe less school equals less work and more free time but we should take in all the factors at hand. No matter how many days of school there will be there still must be a certain amount of class time required, and in the case of the Prosper School Board there would be longer school days starting at 7:55 and ending at 4:04. Having longer school days will begin to change the quality of students’ lives, an example of this can be seen with our student athletes who are worried they will have to attend practice after school at 4:15 then return home to eat and do homework while still being expected to wake up at 6:00am the next day and rebegin the cycle. There’s still one thing missing in a students four day week that wasn’t even mentioned in the student athletes day, every student needs a mental break from all the stress that comes with school and must be allocated time to relax. This period of relaxation resets teenagers minds and helps them refocus again. The Academic Journal states two important points in their latest research on the effect of sleep patterns on student learning first stating that teenagers require sleep to grow and mature, also that cutting sleep by just one hour drops an individual’s alertness by one third. The effects of sleep loss do not become worth the amount of days off as students would waste their time off trying to catch up with their sleep on their days off.
The opinion of teachers should not be taken into account when making this decision as this loss of rest will not affect them. This is displayed by the amount of school staff who said yes to the idea of four day weeks as they would be given fridays off. Teachers do not wish to have friday off for the benefit of the students but for themselves, so they are able to do other activites such as party and spend time with their friends .the opinion of parents shouldn’t be used when deciding as some of them as seen on Fastpool.com comment by Kristina Oudet believe that school is almost a day care for their young adults where they don’t have to worry about them. Thus creating a bias opinion for parents to not intake the other factors at hand, such as their child’s education or the amount of rest they will have.
I personally find it very alarming when the idea of students sacrificing rest just to gain an extra day off becomes acceptable, all students require the correct amount of rest time. If we are unable to keep the students of Prosper in the best mental and physical condition we will begin to see success rates fall lower and lower academic achievements. With the way the school system works now students have enough time for everything including work.shown by Rosies work schedule she will have the same amount of work hours per week without facing the risk of lost sleep and a greater amount of stress. Students such as Rosie prove how efficient the five day week is and why it should be kept, why must something be changed if it works perfectly fine.
With all the reasoning given I find it clear that the four day school week should never be implemented, the cons outweigh the pros as the students quality of life should come before the benefit of anyone else. The schedule implace right now vastly beats the new one with pros and helps students become more successful.
Sincerely, Alex wells