When President Barack Obama prescribed 鈥渓onger school days and school years鈥� to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce last spring, it wasn鈥檛 the first time the subject had come up. For decades, experts and politicians have called for longer school days and an end to summer vacation. As academic achievement and our global pre-eminence have slipped, the campaign to extend school hours has heated up.
The issue isn鈥檛 whether we want American students to grow up to be literate, productive, responsible citizens. The question is, would lengthening the school day and year help achieve that objective? Even if it might edge us in that direction, what economic and social costs would be attached?
The Associated Press recently covered students鈥� responses to the president鈥檚 school-time proposals. One 5th grader declared her intention to 鈥渨alk straight out the door鈥� if they were implemented. Her comment and the AP鈥檚 willingness to spotlight it say more about America鈥檚 scholastic problems than any classroom clock could. A 10-year-old who thinks she can walk out of school when she decides she鈥檚 had enough probably also thinks she can decide what she should learn there.
I was hardly a classroom shrinking violet, but when I was 10, if my parents and teachers had told me I was staying in school till the moon rose, it never would have occurred to me to threaten a walkout. Experts gush about empowering kids, but we鈥檙e really just teaching them to think more highly of themselves than they should. When I made foolish adolescent pronouncements, the wire services never carried them.
Arne Duncan, our federal secretary of education, has joined the chorus deriding summer vacation as a relic of our bygone 鈥渁grarian economy.鈥� Inconveniently, his complaint ignores a few facts. First, farms are busy places, even when it isn鈥檛 July and August, like during spring planting and autumn harvest. Second, it鈥檚 been a hundred years since most Americans lived in the country, let alone on farms. Summer vacation remained a positive aspect of American life even after most of us had moved to suburbs and cities, and while we were becoming a superpower. Third, our current two-month summer recess became an institution not because of farmers, but largely at the insistence of a 20th-century urban middle class that demanded an upper-class summer out of the city.
The president wants schools to 鈥渟tay open late and to let kids in on weekends so they have a safe place to go.鈥� I try to keep my students safe every day, but that鈥檚 not the purpose of my classroom. It鈥檚 been more than 25 years since warned that expecting schools to solve problems 鈥渢he home and other institutions either will not or cannot resolve鈥� exacts a crippling 鈥渆ducational cost.鈥� We need to stop making that mistake.
If America鈥檚 homes aren鈥檛 safe places for children, that鈥檚 a problem school reform can鈥檛 fix.
Experts often attribute American students鈥� disappointing international test results to shorter school days and years. For example, in 2003, Japanese students averaged 926 hours in a school-based education program, while American students spent 799. Japan placed fourth in an international math assessment, while we placed 24th. Finland, on the other hand, spent 861 hours and placed first, while Italy spent more time than we did and placed behind us.
These statistics deserve skepticism, but two things are true. How much time you spend on learning matters. But what you do with that time matters more. That means what teachers do with the time, as well as what students do with it, and afterward, when they鈥檙e home.
Proposals for longer days include everything from remedial instruction, which used to be known as after-school extra help, to chess and drama clubs, which used to be known as after-school chess and drama clubs. Proponents also plan to nurture vaguer 鈥渘ontraditional skills鈥� like 鈥渓eadership鈥� and 鈥渞esiliency鈥� in a 鈥渟eamless learning experience鈥� that includes a 鈥渨eb of community services鈥� as well as opportunities in 鈥渞elevant real-world settings,鈥� formerly known as after-school jobs.
If some students need remedial help beyond current school hours, schools can offer it to them, as many already do. But we shouldn't compel every child to stay just because some may need to.
Proponents of longer school hours contend that 鈥減oorer kids鈥� face 鈥減roblems that interfere with learning,鈥� according to the AP, including 鈥渓ess involvement by their parents,鈥� while children from more-affluent homes benefit from parents who 鈥渞ead to them, have strong language skills,鈥� and 鈥済ive them learning opportunities.鈥� I suspect many nonaffluent parents would object to that generalization. But even where it is true, the solution doesn鈥檛 require longer days and years for every child. If some students need remedial help beyond current school hours, schools can offer it to them, as many already do. But we shouldn鈥檛 compel every child to stay just because some may need to.
Ironically, at the same time experts are prescribing more school hours, they鈥檙e also complaining that American children lack sufficient 鈥減laytime.鈥� They鈥檙e demanding longer recesses during the school day to meet that 鈥渢roubling health and school issue.鈥� In other words, instead of sending kids home to play after school, let鈥檚 make the school day longer so we can give them more time to play before they go home.
How nuts are we?
If we鈥檙e serious about school time, we can address truancy. Roughly 10 percent of 1st graders nationwide are chronically absent. The percentage rises dramatically in districts serving poor children, in some cases ranging above 50 percent. Those children鈥檚 scores predictably depress overall school averages, and remediating those students cuts into teachers鈥� class time with their other students who don鈥檛 miss school. Besides, expecting kids who already don鈥檛 attend school to attend longer school days and years doesn鈥檛 sound like much of a solution.
We can also address how many minutes and hours teachers are compelled to spend on classroom management, and how much chaos their students are forced to endure at the hands of a disruptive few because perverse regulations, the threat of litigation, and pipe-dream behavior theories continue to rule in our schools.
We can address how much time schools divert to social services. We can address how vague, nonacademic objectives have supplanted academic content. All this folly costs more than a summer every year.
Finally, we can understand that giving children the summer away from school isn鈥檛 a waste of their time. Unless we鈥檙e saying that being home is a waste of their time.
If that鈥檚 the case, we鈥檝e got a more perilous problem than an eternity in my classroom can cure.
