Independence parents, teachers divided on impact of 4-day week as vote looms
When the 2023-2024 school year started, Danisha Corbin knew that she had to quit her job.
Corbin, who lives in Independence, had enrolled three children in the Independence School District over the years without issue. But when the district voted in December 2022 to switch to a four-day school week — operating Tuesday to Friday, with most Mondays off — the cost of child care for her two youngest quickly got complicated.
“When (the four-day schedule) first came out, it changed the makeup of my whole household,” Corbin said.
The district’s in-house child care option, a program called Kids’ Safari, costs up to $45 per child per day. With three children on different bus schedules, the program was her best choice on short notice, Corbin said, but it quickly ate through her salary until she left full-time work behind.
“I could only work part-time,” Corbin said. “It really messed up the financial dynamic in my household. Had I kept working, I was only working to pay for child care.”
She says she has developed distrust in the district’s judgment and is considering switching her seventh-grader to Fort Osage, where a five-day schedule is still in place, at the end of the year.
As Independence schools are in the midst of their third year operating on a four-day week, Corbin is one of hundreds of parents looking back and considering if the past few years with a shorter week have served their families well.
And on Nov. 4, Independence voters will decide whether or not to force the district back to a five-day school schedule.
The district’s board has endorsed the four-day school week, saying it improves teacher retention and contributes to higher test scores. Some parents agree, saying it keeps their children engaged and organized.
Other parents say the schedule has eroded their career paths, their children’s focus and their family dynamics as they struggle with unstructured Mondays and four lengthened school days.
“[ISD] basically changed the lifestyle and the dynamic within the home,” Corbin said.
Tuesday’s election would not enshrine the four-day week but rather will determine whether or not the district gets to continue to decide its schedule for itself.
Preparing to vote
The Independence School Board voted in 2022 to implement the four-day school week for the 2023-2024 school year, citing teacher shortages. District leaders argued that having an extra day off can give veteran teachers a reason to stay with ISD, while attracting a larger pool of skilled educators who are newer to teaching.
Last year, the Missouri General Assembly passed a law requiring districts in bigger cities to put that question before all voters instead of getting to make the decision to switch to a four-day school week on their own.
About a quarter of school districts in Missouri run on a four-day schedule, mostly in rural areas, which are not affected by the new law. When ISD made the switch, it was the largest in the state to do so.
It’s the only four-day week district in the state large enough to require a vote.
A no vote on Nov. 4 would force ISD to revert to a five-day schedule until the issue can be placed back on the ballot.
A yes vote would put the choice back in the hands of the Independence School Board, which has signaled it plans to maintain the four-day week for now.
The Independence chapter of the National Education Association, under which ISD teachers are unionized, declined to take an official stance on the four-day week. So did the Independence Council PTA, which collectively represents the parent teacher associations at all ISD schools. “The feedback that we’ve received shows that many of our educators support it,” INEA president Jorjana Pohlman told The Star. “At the same time, we know it’s not necessarily a one size fits all situation.”
In conversations with The Star, the presidents of both organizations emphasized that the INEA and ICPTA are staying neutral, but that they’ve heard arguments from members both for and against the four-day week.
“There’s varying opinions. There’s passionate opinions,” Pohlman said. “A lot of the staff feels like there’s room for growth, as there is on anything.”
Pohlman said that many teachers enjoy the work-life balance that a four-day week brings, but that maintaining a positive relationship with the district has also been a priority for educators ahead of the vote.
“Whatever the decision is, we just want it to support students and educators,” Pohlman said. “That’s the most important thing, is focusing on our students.”
Interim ISD Superintendent Dr. Cynthia Grant was out of town and unavailable for comment. The district was not available for comment Wednesday.
Child care concerns
Some ISD families have been unfazed by the reality of no-school Mondays, with stay-at-home parents, other family members or paid child care providers available to look after students. For others, finding extra child care has drastically changed their household.
“The public opinion against the four-day school week tends to lean towards its impact on single parent homes, families where both parents work or marginalized kids,” Young wrote in an email to The Star. “Not everyone has someone who can watch their child on Monday.”
Kids’ Safari, the district’s school-age child care program, enrolls Pre-K to 8th grade students and runs on most days off, including Mondays. There are four sites this school year, serving between one and 10 schools each.
Costs vary by time, day and age group, with discounts if parents sign up for several days at a time. A full day, single-use trip to Kids’ Safari on a weekday off school, including the missing Mondays, costs $45 per child.
ISD parent Ryan Griffin said that his 7-year-old daughter often reports enjoying Kids’ Safari more than school. Even so, the a la carte child care program wasn’t Griffin’s first choice.
“I reached out to six, eight day cares and they said no, they don’t offer just Mondays,” Griffin said. “They all acknowledged too that they’re getting a lot of calls because parents don’t know what to do with this one day where they can’t find child care.”
When the four-day week was first announced, Griffin said, he balanced the new child care responsibilities with his ex-wife by taking alternating Mondays off work. Like Corbin, he ended up switching to part-time work to make the schedule fit and is now back full-time, but considering pulling his child out of the district if the four-day week stays.
Some parents, however, say the schedule has allowed them to carve out free time in unusual places.
Older students who are involved in extracurricular activities like band, sports, theater or debate are often busy with practices or competitions on Saturdays, ISD parent Jaime Jensen said. Having Mondays open gives the Jensen family an extra day to schedule appointments without sacrificing club commitments.
“It has been nice for us because we can plan doctors appointments on Mondays,” Jensen said.
Battling burnout
The four-day school week creates four longer days instead of five shorter ones. ISD parents are split on whether this shift has helped or hindered their children’s ability to focus in class.
Parents of younger children have been more critical of the longer afternoons the schedule includes, Independence Council PTA President Judy Young said. ISD elementary schools start at 8 or 8:30 a.m. and go until 4:30 p.m., Young said, with students struggling to stay on task in the afternoon.
“That’s a pretty long time for a 5-year-old to go, from 10:30 lunchtime to 4:30 end,” Young said. “If you’ve been around an elementary school kid, a hungry kid is not a happy kid.”
For ISD parent Kendra Beggs, longer days have led to more direct support for her children with Individualized Education Programs, or IEPs. Beggs has four children in ISD schools this year, with another child having graduated since the four-day schedule started.
“We absolutely love the four-day week,” Beggs said. “My kids have all actually improved. I feel like they have better attention, they’re more present in class.”
Though the shortened schedule “took a second to adjust to,” particularly for her then-elementary schoolers, Beggs says she feels that going back to five-day weeks now would dysregulate her children. One of her children has been diagnosed with ADHD, Beggs said, and she feels that spending longer days at school has improved his focus.
“I’m not having to fight them,” Beggs said. “They never get burnt out. Every week they’re happy to go. If it goes back to five days I’m going to have a whole household, including myself, of people who are going to be real unhappy about it.”
Others, including Griffin, report their children lose focus by the end of the extended school day, and that they’re seeing signs of burnout.
“My daughter - I don’t have anything to compare it to, but I feel like she’s more tired and worn out and unable to focus at the end of a day,” Griffin said. “She’s less interested in doing homework-type things. If I try to present her with homework-type stuff on a weekend or in the summer, she’s more accepting to it.”
Student service struggles
Staying on a four-day schedule long-term would continue to have a disproportionate impact on families who rely on ISD schools for meals, social services and other resources, Young said.
The district provides meals at select buildings on Mondays, serving some but not all of the students who usually receive a free or reduced meal. Opting into a four-day week now could come at a particularly bad time for families who rely on SNAP benefits, Young said, now that the nation is facing a Nov. 1 end to SNAP funding, Head Start child care aid and other forms of federal assistance.
“There’s the impact to special education students, low-income families, kids on the margin that struggle, any time you change the structure of the school year,” Young said. “So much of our community relies on schools.”
Some high school students have taken advantage of the extra day to take college classes or work jobs, Young said. But Corbin and others worry about how other older students are faring with extra free time, particularly those who have difficult home lives.
“I get it - people shouldn’t be using the school as a babysitting situation or for food,” Corbin said. “But you now take one more meal away from a kid who might not have eaten all weekend. You just opened up one more day of them being sexually abused if that’s going on in their home. Or physically abused.”
Too soon to tell?
Pohlman said that she expected educators would be hesitant to speak publicly one way or the other about the four-day week. She also cautioned residents against seeing either schedule model as a permanent fix for ongoing challenges faced by both students and teachers.
At the Oct. 14 board meeting where the release was approved, board member Brandi Pruente said she doesn’t feel the four-day week has been running long enough to establish a conclusive link between shorter school days and higher student test scores.
The Independence School Board reported earlier this month that the district’s Annual Performance Report scores under the Missouri School Improvement Program increased from 70% to 80% between 2022 and 2024. These numbers are based on data from the 2023-2024 school year, which was the first year of a four-day schedule.
Multiple ISD parents told The Star that they would want more data in order to see the four-day week as a major positive influence on student achievement scores.
“You can pull data points that favor your argument for just about anything,” Griffin said.
Pohlman agreed, saying student test scores were “trending in a positive direction” but that the union would be more comfortable with success claims after multiple years of data collection.
“We don’t know that there’s necessarily enough data at this point to make an assertion about a direct correlation between the four-day week and student test scores,” Pohlman said. “Ideally we would need more time and data to make that determination.”
ISD teachers also are paying close attention to how the decision on the four-day week will affect their workload, Pohlman said.
The district has said that the four-day week allows ISD to attract and retain more experienced teachers.
For parents like Corbin, educator experience is only helpful if it leads to better communication, she said. Since the four-day week started, Corbin said, she’s been frustrated that some of her children’s teachers have stopped sending homework, and that others have directed students to take the lead during parent-teacher conferences.
““I want to talk to a teacher and I want to know what my kid needs to get straightened out on,” Corbin said. “All of that, I want to know from the teacher, the horse’s mouth, not my student.”
The union hopes that if the four-day week does pass, Pohlman said, teachers will be able to count on ISD to prioritize retention in other ways that also help students.
“Really, teachers want what’s best for students,” Pohlman said. Supportive learning environments, adequate time for instructions and all that balance. And that’s true whether we’re on a four day or a five day schedule.”
This story was originally published October 30, 2025 at 6:07 AM.
