For this generation of students to remain competitive with their international peers as adults, they need to start spending more time in school. This week President Obama proposed that American school children extend their time in class, either by lengthening the school day, or spending less time on summer vacation.
“We can no longer afford an academic calendar designed when America was a nation of farmers who needed their children at home plowing the land at the end of each day,” Obama said. He continued to say “That calendar may have once made sense, but today, it puts us at a competitive disadvantage. Our children spend over a month less in school than children in South Korea. That is no way to prepare them for a 21st century economy.”
In fact, American children spend the least amount time in the classroom when compared to other countries. Currently, the school year length in the States is 180 days. Advocates are pushing further toward a 200-day school year, which would align with Thailand, Scotland and the Netherlands, and leave us a close second with Israel, South Korea and Japan, who leads with a 243-day school year.
via MSN Encarta
This comes as Obama makes it very clear that education is on his hot-list of priorities. He admits the notion of spending more time in school is not “wildly popular”, but necessary.
He was applauded for his breadth of knowledge regarding the public education system in the U.S. He cited that one-third of the 13- and 14-year-olds in our country cannot read at an appropriate level for their age, and that the eighth grade curriculum is two years behind competing nations. He says the part of the problem is our “race to the bottom” mindset, wherein states are comfortable with lower standards for students.
Obama and his Secretary of Education Arne Duncan are truly advocates for a superior education system than that we’ve previously and currently known. It’s imperative that states use the stimulus package money to rebuild curriculum, increase teacher pay, improve school conditions, offer newer technologies to students and even extend the school year to ensure that this generation can not only keep up with their international peers, but even surpass them in the professional environment of the coming decades.
posted on March 12th, 2009 by Brandi
Tags: arne duncan, barack obama, public school
Posted in News, Politics | 347 Comments »
March 12th, 2009 at 8:34 pm
Hello! I am completely apposed to this whole “adding days to make our country look good” crap. Yes I am a student but that is not what has me so fired up. I also live on a farm. Everyday after school I go and help my dad feed the cows right after school. If I would have to stay at school longer I would not be able to get my homework completed because my dad could not feed without the help of my older sister and I. Also, over the summer I am working with my 4-H animals and also helping my dad from the time I get up till the time I go to sleep. If this becomes a law, a lot of the farms in the U.S. will not be able to continue because they rely on teenagers help. The cost of meat will definitely rise, not only beef but all meet. I believe President Obama should worry about our debt problems before the problems that we don’t have with our education system.
March 12th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
The importance of our students education is the quality rather then the quantity. We need better teachers not more time at school. This is an addition to my last comment.
March 14th, 2009 at 11:29 pm
I agree with longer school years, but I question the longer day. With most families working full time, how are families supposed to spend more time together with longer school days. I work then pick my daughter up from school, make dinner while she does homework (help when she needs it) we eat, and by then it’s almost time for bed. The day is already long enough.
March 23rd, 2009 at 6:41 pm
Doing more of the wrong things never fixes anything. The problems with our schools does not rest in the number of hours in attendance. It falls on too heavy a testing load, too much meaningless data collection cutting into teaching/learning time. You can find data to support any opinion if you look hard enough or pay enough for it. Our schools are suffering from the many problems that result from poverty, crime, lack of discipline and over regulation. Yet we are now and have forever been the best. Let’s return to those basics that got us there.
March 25th, 2009 at 9:27 pm
I completely oppose this kids need days off of school i understand the imporance of school and education but if you go and spend your whole day at school you would know…. the foods nasty and bathrooms gross its not a very pleasant day for us..
March 26th, 2009 at 5:40 pm
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………they expect us at a minimum 1 hr of homework each day…the food sucks…no time to spend any freakin’ time wth our friends… ok who the heck voted for obama…
March 26th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
more schools means more stress…more stress means more depression…more depression means more suicides
March 28th, 2009 at 10:27 pm
i WAS an obama supporter, but his plan to lengthen school days and years is flat out pointless. if he does, there will be MORE kids dropping out and skipping. they wouldnt like it and they would quit; its not that hard to think about. he thinks we need to learn more? how about he has them cut out the stupid pointless things we’ll NEVER use in our daily livves as adultts? like all that graphingg algebra, geometry stuff? that stuff is soo pointless and it takes time away from learning about the things we need. more parenting classes cus lets alll face it, more and more girls are becoming pregnant when they’re still in highschool. he needs to think about damn logical things, nottt things that we will never use. whyy not a class all about the efffects of drunk driving? i lost my best friend 2 months ago to it cus she didnt realize what would happen, whyy not a class about what drugs do to youu? PRACTICAL classes are what we need, nott longer days and years. im startingg to wonder if mccain would’ve been better. obama’s views have changed and the things he plans to do nott just about school will make this country crash to the ground and no one is saying anything about it.
March 31st, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Welcome to Obamaville–it’s exactly what he promised from the beginning. It’s what WE voted for–change! More federal government oversight, involvement, dictating what we will do with our lives–including how many more days we will spend in the government’s schools. I’m seeing a scary pattern here…..I’m also seeing a scary pattern with the potential student responses: misspellings, no punctuation, terrible sentence structures….this IS their mother tongue, isn’t it? And we can’t even get that right. Hmm, more “practical” classes to fill our day? While the rest of the world learns how to do equations, READ and WRITE correctly, take technology to the next level, interpret the deeper writings their societies have created and create more of them, grapple with deeper questions of morality, we’ll cover how not to shake your baby when she cries, why not to share needles, how to balance your checkbook (whoops–can’t do that, that’s math), how to put on a condom, and how to designate a driver when you party underage so you don’t kill anyone. Great plan. People are already asking for the bar to be lowered. We are barely working above the lowest common denominator at times. I say this as a public school teacher. I see bright spots, but is sure does seem like we glorify mediocrity sometimes. I guess it’s because in several of the schools I’ve worked in and visited, it’s cool to be ignorant. I agree with most of you–it’s not the hours or days in school that really make a difference, it’s the way we use them. Heck, homeschoolers are still kicking our butts. And they often do it in half the time. However, I can see the argument for simply more time–maybe days rather than hours. Possibly, rearranging the school year for urban-type districts (like the one I work in) so that there aren’t that many more days, they are simply spread out throughout the year, giving short “breaks” through out the year, and making a shorter summer vacation. That way there is potentially more retention of material at the end of the summer.
April 12th, 2009 at 7:07 pm
Ray Bradbury on school:
“You can’t rid yourselves of all the odd ducks in just a few years. The home environment can undo a lot you try to do at school. That’s why we’ve lowered the kinderggarten age year after year until now we’re almost snatching them from the cradle.”
-Fire Chief Beatty, Fahrenheit 451
How about, instead of more school, we have less. Less time for kids to sit at their desks and do busywork and take orders, and more time for them to explore the world and have fun and learn. Yes, we’ll fall behind in the global market, but once people are away from the indoctrination of compulsory schooling they’ll start to realize that the global rat race is stupid and that we should have been working together all this time instead trying to knock each other down.
April 13th, 2009 at 10:00 am
i disagree with obama we should not have longer school hours or longer school years we already are so tired when we get home i do not think we could handle any more time in school i agree with mia WE NEED BETTER TEACHERS NOT MORE TIME WITH CRAPPY ONES
April 15th, 2009 at 11:21 pm
Once again government, not educators, spout off “educational reform” without looking closely at the dynamics and demographics of the typical US classroom before comparing those in the US educational system to other countries.
I admit I am making an assumption that the most of the classrooms in the other countries we are being compared to are populated by the students born in the same country, and are homogeneous in terms of race, culture, and religion. (In other words, the Japanese classrooms are typically populated with mostly Japanese students who share common cultural ties and beliefs). I also assume that the parents in these countries share, more or less, similar values with regard to their childrens’ education and are quite involved in this regard.
Compare this to a typical US classroom, an environment I am quite familiar with as a seven year veteran teacher in a California school district. In my second grade classroom alone, I have students from China, Yemen, Samoa, Syria, Mexico, El Salvador, Brazil, and the Philippines and are English Language Learners (which means English is their second language – most of their parents speak limited or no English) My classroom is a revolving door of students. Four students I started with at the beginning of the school year trickled away during the school year at different times, moving to other schools for various reasons. These students were replaced by other students who trickled into my classrooms, having moved from other school districts. moved due to economic circumstances. Two of these students entered my classroom with no English. Of these two, one only completed six months of first grade in their native country before entering my classroom. Of my 20 students, only five were born in the United States. Only two are considered “English Only” students (parents only speak English-no second language).
So, are we really comparing apples to apples here? I am going to ASSUME that these demographics do not TYPICALLY exist in a Japanese, Scottish, South Korean, Thai, Chinese, classroom. Now on top of all this cultural diversity is the economic diversity that a typical classroom has: 90% of my students qualify for the “free lunch program” and while I don’t recall the exact annual salary qualifies a family for this program, I do know it is under $25,000 for a family of four…I have children who come in to classroom without breakfast, without enough sleep and worse, from fractured families under immense strain. How can these politicians compare our schools to those in other countries like South Korea? Let’s get real…
April 15th, 2009 at 11:26 pm
Ooops. I truly apologize for all the grammatical errors! I thought I would have a chance to edit before I submitted this entry, but I hit the submit button without thinking….
April 29th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
I sure hope they intend to DRASTICALLY increase teacher pay. This is a large part of the reason there is a Quality vs Quantity debate a midst this issue. If we paid our teacher more than dirt, he might be able to retain the “good ones” and give our children a better quality education, rather a bigger quantity of education.
I see lots of teachers retiring, students and parents going to home-schooling methods, and private school enrollment increasing. Or just flat-out leaving the country ….
April 30th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
This is another asinine example of a non-teacher (university prof’s don’t count) proposing to know what’s best for students and teachers. I have taught high school for 7 years and have no doubt that extending the school day would destroy the entire system. Let’s think about the fact that kids are already in school 7 hours a day! Who can absorb learning for 7 strait hours? Not to mention busing and extra-curricular activities. We’d have middle school kids getting home at 6 or 7 pm! Get real! This guy, the president for whom I voted, obviously has NO CLUE how much work teachers put in before and after school each day as it is. There is simply NO additional time in the day for good teachers (who are constantly grading and coming up with new and better lessons) to be doing even MORE! Get REAL!
I am a huge advocate for a 4 day school week. Yes, that would extend the day by 1.5 hours each day. But the reward of three days off would be a huge morale boost for students and teachers. When morale is up, so is performance! This will save on gas for buses, electricity, food, and give teachers much needed additional planning/grading time.
EXTEND THE SCHOOL DAY AND FACE WIDESPREAD TEACHER REBELLION!
April 30th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
Omg. First of all…why would some1 criticize internet spelling anyway? Do you honestly think we’re that dumb? that we don’t know your suppose to capitilize “I”s and put periods at the end of sentences or use capitals? ugh.
Second…most teens I know barely have tolerance for what we have to do now…it’s not good but squeezing us tighter is just going to result in more drop outs and class skipping… just like how if we didn’t use mp3 players/phones in class a little bit, there would be way less students in class…
May 3rd, 2009 at 1:01 pm
[...] Proposes Longer School Days, Extended School Year Obama Proposes Longer School Days | Edu in Review Blog For this generation of students to remain competitive with their international peers as adults, [...]
May 5th, 2009 at 8:57 am
We should have longer school day and /year because we as american are behaver a lot and we need this to help us out for better job and to help us to get ready for college.
May 13th, 2009 at 9:45 am
Obama is comparing apples to oranges. The Asian culture is completely different from our American one. In Asian countries, including South Korea, success is expected (i.e. CEO’s commit suicide for fear of being recognized for failure). Fifteen year old girls are not popping out 3 babies that the taxpayers are supporting financially. The American CULTURE needs to change; teachers cannot change the children of the world if their parents do not keep the momentum going. Rather than extending the school day and year, Obama should require people to pass a test to reproduce children rather than have as many children as possible, knowing the hardworking taxpayers will foot the bill. I’ve seen children being “raised” by people who couldn’t keep a plant alive. In order to succeed IN SCHOOL, certain conditions must exist OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL: THEY NEED TO BE READ TO, NOT sat in front of a TV. THEY NEED EXERCISE. THEY NEED TO EAT BALANCED MEALS! The children raised by families who are unable to, or unwilling to, provide these will NOT transform completely because their school days are extended!!! TAKE A LOOK AT THE BIGGER PICTURE, OBAMA!!!
May 13th, 2009 at 10:18 am
Longer school days is retarded. If we go to school longer than we do now then i gaurantee that more kids get into fights due to the stress. So we just need to forget about the longer freaking school days. Just because the government wants more money.
May 13th, 2009 at 11:41 pm
Obama iz crazy! i mean, does he even think about anyone else in the country? Hello?! we’re all here! i totally disagree with everyone who wants more school days. This izn’t fair. Don’t u think i want more homework or anymore of these things? i’m south korean, but i’ve never went to school there. does obama want to be even with every country in the world? he really should think about the weathers in the usa. where i live, i’d be fried up in the summer going to school. obama izn’t going to make anything better by extending school days
May 16th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
I will preface this comment by indicating that I am a former school teacher and current professor of education. President Obama makes two very solid arguments in regard to extended our educational opportunities.
1.) Our US school year is based an an incredibly irrelevant system related to the necessity of farm work and it is well-beyond time this changed.
2.) We are not adequately prepared to compete with other nations. Asians come here to the US and ceaselessly attain scholarships, higher educations, and great jobs due to the importance of education in their home countries. Extended the school year would be a good way to demonstrate our commitment to educational excellence.
The oppositional argument that we need higher quality teachers is laughable. Teacher-preparation programs are rigorous in nature. Becoming an educator is more difficult than ever because we expect more from our teachers each year. Yes there may be some bad teachers in the systems that have been around for a long time and did not have to complete these training programs. However, our teachers joining the field at this point are more than prepared to provide an absolute education to our children. We simply do not have enough time with our current academic calendar.
Though I do support President Obama’s notion of increasing the time spent oin education, there is no way we could increase the hours in the day. If we want the most effective education, this simply would not work. Maintaining a child’s attention for a longer duration than we currently are requiring would be near-impossible. We would simply be wasting time trying to teacher for 10 hours a day. Therefore, a longer school year…YES. A longer school day, NO.
May 18th, 2009 at 1:52 pm
thats is bull no1 likes to go to scool and most people are skipping scool becouse the year is to long. if oyu make the days longer i dont think people would mind. but going for more days of school is just going to make people mad and we are going to have more delinquets than ever befor. i think you should worry about changing some of th the laws 1st. we are the top rated country in the world that has lots of people in prison. if some1 shoots somebody and its provin that person should have the death sentance.
May 25th, 2009 at 7:31 am
[...] school than children in South Korea. That is no way to prepare them for a 21st century economy.? Obama Proposes Longer School Days | Edu in Review Blog Want to stop abortion and premarital sex? One way is to enable kids to complete their educations [...]
May 25th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
gooooooooood obma i like that idea
May 25th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
I am a teacher. This is my 16th year of teaching. I barely make $40,000. I willingly submitted myself the taking the National Board test for early childhood teachers. I had to redo a portion of the test, and when I redid it I was only 9 points away from passing. I worked on this test for THREE YEARS. I will not know if I passed until November. I have just found out that I may not get the raise I was promised when I began taking the test.
Now let’s assume I passed. I am now expected to teach a longer day for more days per year for the same pay as a teacher who is not National Board Certified. I don’t think so. I will have to go to a private school or just start keeping kids in my home. My child’s babysitter makes more money than I do.
Now merit pay is potentially a very bad thing knowing what I know about politics in schools. Principals will be repsonsible for deciding who gets the merit pay, and believe me some principals are not honest. Administrators decide which students to put into the classrooms. Teachers do not get to pick their students. So if my students start out at a lower level than the room across the hall, and her scores are higher at the end of the year than mine, she gets the raise and I don’t, even though the total gain in my room is more than hers. I would resort to keeping what works best all to myself, and so would other teachers. There is no way to be fair with this, because we are talking about children. There is no way to predict how much they will learn, even though we would like for them all to learn.
So far, our district has decided not to use the money to extend the year or increase teacher pay. They realize that when the money is no longer there, they would be unable to sustain the amount that was invested. Our district is hiring part time tutors who do not get benefits. This makes sense to me, but the children will have to be pulled out of regular classroom instruction to be tutored. It’s like one step forward and two steps back. Sure they are learning from the bottom up, but the top still keeps getting farther away. They pull them out, yet I am still help responsible for what they learn.
These particular students could benefit from a longer day, but not all of them need that. I believe the tutors should take over after the regular school day. That would work, but then it would inconvenience some parents who might have to come and pick up their own children from school.
I hope a solution comes soon, because my three year old knows more than some of my first graders come into first grade knowing. Something has to be done.
June 2nd, 2009 at 12:25 pm
I don’t think making the school year longer will help anything. I know my son’s school whom I pay over $5000.00 a year has no air conditioning. In September I was at a back to school night and some of the class rooms were so hot that it was unbearable. The teacher said you should be here in May and June. How are you suppose to teach children and expect them to learn when they can’t even concentrate due to the heat. My son happens to be a honor student and does very well anyway. My daugher who is grade school same thing they have a ceiling fan. This is suppose to keep a class room full of children cool. HOw come some children can do well and other can not? That is the question, not lets make them stay longer. Will a few more weeks of school really make a difference?
June 9th, 2009 at 7:02 pm
I think that it is the structure of the school day that needs to be examined. Home school children typically are farther ahead of publically schooled children and test better, and typically finish their day in 3-4 hours of instruction 180 days a year versus publically schooled children who go to school 6-7 hours a day. I know that the student-teacher ratios are smaller in home school situations, but come on the length of the day is not going to help the education system. It is the quality not the quantity of instruction that makes a difference.
June 9th, 2009 at 9:26 pm
Ok,
1. Do some people really think that the way we type online is the same as the way we type a paper for class?
- The only reason we type the way we do when “iming” or texting is because we are to lazy to type out the entire word. That doesn’t mean that we will do the same in a paper because we actually care about our grades.
2. I think that lengthening the school year is not that bad of an idea, of course i don’t want it to happen but 20 days could help.
– If they try and do away with summer, their will be some serious problems. Many businesses rely on the profits that come in the summer. And their are courses that you can take in the summer so you won’t forget what you have learned in the school year.
3. Lengthening the school week is stupid. We need Saturday and Sunday, its the only time when we get to rest during the week and we still have homework over the weekend.
– Why don’t we instead try and improve the teachers. I think that quality is better than quantity, and if they had a system that actually sorted the good teachers from the bad or something of that nature, or maybe just not hire bad teachers or FIRE bad teachers we wouldn’t even be having this discussion.
They need to enhance the way that teachers become teachers, and have some kind of system that makes sure that the teachers are being good teachers. Maybe if they raised the pay of the teachers we would see more good teachers.
June 11th, 2009 at 11:01 am
I back this proposition 100% the United States has fallen behind other countries in what we should be leading and innovating we need a stronger education system. If that means that we need to stay in school longer hours and into the summer then so be it . Now I am not for takin the summer completly away but making it shorter.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
I think that’s the most stupid thing I’ve ever heard any president say. Students do not need longer days in school. it’s not the school districts fault that the children don’t learn well. I beleive that it’s the lack of interest the students put in school because my son is an all A student and if he can do it so can any other student. They are all the same age and young. They need to put there mind in education.
June 19th, 2009 at 7:44 am
My parents grew up with a longer summer vacation then me. They had shorter school days, too. My grandparent’s were even shorter and they went through The Great Depression. They had it rough, but they got through it. My parents are both two very successful adults. They both helped out their parents a lot with the extra time they had out of school. They also found true love because they had time to. They have been married for more than twenty years. Why can’t we go back to that time and age. Everything was simple and realistic.
I say President Obama is too competitive. He wants to go down in history for everything. He doesn’t care as much about us as he does about being the greatest black person since Martin Luther King Jr. Why doesn’t he use some of my daddy’s hardearned tax money that he’s sending to lazy, nonworking crackpots to buy him a clue.
June 19th, 2009 at 7:47 am
My cousin only comes up from Texas in the summer. What? Do I not get to see her and hang out with her and have FAMILY time anymore?!
Thanks for ruining my youth.
June 20th, 2009 at 9:08 pm
If he wants to lengthen the school year, by how much? How many hours are adequate? Just some random handpicked number? And what is going to keep that number from increasing in another year when national averages don’t improve but actually get significantly worse?–Nothing. We will add more money and mandate more hours and everything will continue to go downhill, just at a faster rate. Imagine the cost of adding beds in the classrooms for students to sleep in when the hours start to exceed 12 hours days—just like how we introduced school lunches in 1946. Instead of saying, “hey maybe this is an indication that too much time is being spent in the classroom, considering the fact that activities originally performed FREELY at home, like eating lunch and playing outside, are being duplicated unnecessarily, wastefully, and illegally in school”, we thought of the children.
It seems to me like a 3 year old just took a crayon and started writing weird rules that are now somehow becoming laws; they don’t follow any principals or even basic logic…but they are punishable by death. Obviously, the answer is that nobody should be forced against their will to spend ANY time in a federal school. That’s why nobody can decide on an arbitrary number….there is no such thing as a correct number of hours or days. It can only be correct on an individual basis, which makes sense since everybody has their own perspective. Not only would such an individual arrangement be VOLUNTARY but it would also be customized to the individual’s wishes, and CHEAPER (avg. public student cost is about $10,000 of wasted taxpayer dollars). Some people like to spend the whole day in school. Good for them. Most people do not; and they don’t like paying for it either. So before people start debating the typical pros and cons, they should realize that there can’t be an acceptable amount of time mandated by public schools because nothing about universal public education is just or moral in anyway. You’re forced to go, you’re forced to pay for it, and you’re forced to do well.
And does education need to even take place in a classroom? What about a library, or a bike ride, or a nature hike, or a job experience? Kiss those goodbye.
July 18th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Making school longer will not help anything. Infact it will cause more stress and worse teaching do to teachers getting tired and stressed out. I’m 14 years old and can read and write just fine and no offense but Obama is making Americans sound like were all idiots. The thing we need to focus on is the economy, and if your so worried about education better teachers.
July 19th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
Reading the posts above, I am wondering how so many juvenile people came across this website.
July 21st, 2009 at 10:44 pm
Studies show that no more than around 20 students should be in a class with one teacher in elementary school yet we’re stuffing 30+ students in plenty of classrooms. Teachers say they just can’t give the kids the attention they need because they have so many other students to whom they must attend. Kids that need the extra attention don’t get it. Instead, they sit around in class wondering what to do and get farther behind because there isn’t enough room to ask a teacher to explain a problem twice or individually. Extending the school day won’t solve that problem.
July 30th, 2009 at 8:51 am
i completely disagree with all this. we need time with our family. in my situation my mom has twin baby’s and my step dad is in the army………i come home from school do homework do chores help my mom with the baby’s eat dinner help my mom put the baby’s to bed and then i take a shower and do any remaining homework read if i want (or if i have time) and go to bed then i wake up a 5:45 the next day and get ready for school.so more time in school is gonna give me less time do homework i’ll have to spend a maximum of like an hour with the babies and then chores dinner and a shower. wheres time for family/friends/ just being a teenager time.? there is none. i used to like obama (before he came into office that is) but now he has me wondering of course my parents still like him tho.
August 13th, 2009 at 12:16 am
The whole reason there is a bad education system is because of the way the whole education system is set up, part of the reason I personally hate school is because you learn mostly meaningless things that I my entire life have never used. I use things taught to me in elementary school because that’s all you really need, middle school to me right now is pointless because i breeze by due to the fact that nothing really matters. I don’t care where to put a comma in a sentence over the years you find that out on your own. The writing and reading classes are a joke, and for racial problems it’s because why would you really want good grades if you could just make millions of dollars by making songs that are completely stupid that the world loves. They should start to in a way racially divide schools because black and Hispanic kids don’t learn anyways because there to busy causing trouble except for a smart few. I actually learn more in watching science or discovery channels for half an hour than a whole day of school. Those shows sum up would you learn in school for a whole semester.
August 13th, 2009 at 12:39 am
I had speech class last year and i learned A LOT in that class, not even really related to speech topics because my teacher taught interesting things when we didn’t have class time. When i get interested i “absorb” knowledge rather than it hitting a eardrum and bouncing out in regular classes. Think about it.
August 13th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
[...] amazing is that it was President Obama who was leading the [...]
September 27th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Okay, this is bullshit. I’m a high-school age student who wakes up at 5:30 am and comes home at 3 pm everyday. On average, I spend about 3 hours a day doing homework and go to sleep at around 11 or 12. I definitely DO NOT get the necessary 6 hours of sleep a girl of my age needs, because school and schoolwork takes up over half of my day. Imagine if schooldays were even longer. Kids would burn out, we’d go insane. Yes, Japan and other countries have longer schooldays. They also have higher suicide rates. In any case, if you go to a high school that does not have proper textbooks or good teachers, mores hours spent at school aren’t going to make a difference. Try granting money to under-funded and under-staffed schools so they can get the equipment they need.
September 27th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
If the president really wanted to help the education system and the economy, he would changed the student/teacher ratios to 10:1, I bet school performance would improve. Of course that would mean more teachers would be needed (hey more jobs!) and more schools and classrooms (hey, lots more jobs!!) and more funding to our education system and more incentive for people to become teachers, but i’d rather pay taxes towards that then to half the things I pay taxes towards. Maybe he could create even more jobs by placing a staffed clinic in each school so kids could get health care, and have a place to do school work while they are sick without infecting the other students.
Increasing the school day isn’t going to help, nor will lengthening the school year. Kids are overcrowded, the food they are being fed is terrible and they get sent to school sick in cramped quarters.
Let’s make an effort to keep the technology and textbooks up to date, create a better learning enviroment for our kids, and for our teachers, and THEN talk about extending their days. It may make a difference when Weve done what we could to fix the day they already have.
September 27th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
I am a 13 year old student who has already completes u.s. history, math A, MATH B, Physics, living enviroment, english, and global history regents. All with grades passing and most with grades 90 and above. I work hard for my grades and although my school day is rigid with added xtra curricular’s, I still find time to study. While reading Obama’s proposal i felt infuriated because it was as if he had made a fisted blow at students like me. Students who work hard, and now are expected to take on THREE MORE HOURS. In my opinion this proposal is pure foolishness and I pray that it will be vetoed, if presented to congress.
Firstly i go to a school (Medgar evers college preparatory highschool) where the program is extremely rigorous – i have two ap classes and two honors classes as well as chemistry and pre calculus, whos homework combined keep me up for 2 extra hours or more. Keep in mind i am a ninth grade student who is of course trained and understanding of the topics but with these classes combined with a number of extra curricular’s after school how exactly is this plan going to help me. I understand what he is trying to go for, but in my opinion it is just going to increase the number of high school drop out rates as well as other social issues. No teenager or child student – even one who loves school is going to want to go through with a extra three hours added to their school day and a shortened summer vacation! I know i wouldn’t, this would put a strain to my extra curricular’s as well as time for me. As for high school drop out rates i can guarantee that students/high school students would not want to go through with these changes, i can say that the rates would take a significant increase. The added pressure and the work would put a strain to their lives. In conclusion Obama should think about the clear divison between education and “FUN”.
September 27th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
That is stupid. were not China or France. this the U.S.A not the U.S.S.R!
we should not be forced to go to school longer then what we already have to. most kids haves lives out side of school!
this is bullshit! making the days longer will not make student go to school or learn anymore than what they are. If anything, were going to skip more out of the disease called bordum and anger,. nothing is going to change.
If this were to happen more kids would end up dropping out.
im a high school student!
i get up every day at 5:00 am to get ready for zero hour. then after school i have sports after school!
what i a life right.
yea and by the way I and many others have totally notices the changes you promised. Yay!!!! Were in debt more woohoo way to help the country! NOT!!!!!!
September 27th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
This is F*******
September 27th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
Curse you, Obama! We need not longer school days- but better education. If school remains in the sorry state it is in, there will be more stress and most likely more teen suicide. Do you want that, huh? We won’t HAVE a future if you do this- think straight. Quality, not quaninty (I’m saying that we need better education rather than more hours put in)!
And if you do make this move- I’ll most likely commit suicide (schools are horrible the way they are right now) or try and catch some illness to avoid schooling… and I’ll make damn well sure your actions are blamed for it. And I’m sure many others will kill themselves too- listen up to what the people in this comment field are saying. So, don’t you DARE do this. I mean it- I might just be a kid but we kids do matter more than you think in our society. You expect “great things out of every one of us” but yet you’re not doing your part (making education a less stressful experience- allow us to learn things things that actually PERTAIN TO OUR F**** LIVES!)
September 27th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
ARE YOU F***** KIDDING ME??? I go to high school and i have a minimum of 3 hrs of homework per night. if he does this i will personally drop out.
September 27th, 2009 at 7:17 pm
What happened to living to be happy?
September 27th, 2009 at 7:19 pm
The last anyone heard of this was in March. So relax because this probably got shot down a long time ago.
September 27th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
I fail to see how longer days or year will help. A few of my friends literally pass out when they get home from the normal day. They just lie down on the bed or couch and doze off and these are the ones getting up 10 minutes before their bus shows up. Sometimes I wonder just how they even pass. I wonder how I pass too. I get home and am so tired I wanna just go to bed and at times I do and end up getting up at 7!(falling asleep when I get home at 3). Of course I have to eat and do homework and by then its almost time for bed. And now you’re trying to put MORE hours? I barely have time for myself except on weekends which itself is restricted heavily by other chores I have to do.
And a longer year too? My school gets so hot in September and June alone that at times we need to be moved to different rooms because there is no way to bare the heat and now they want to stick us there in July and August? Simply put WE ARE NOT CHINA. We’re NOT South Korea. We’re NOT Japan. We’re just not. If anything we need more time off.
Look at homeschooling I have a friend who is home schooled and he only takes a fraction of the amount of time I take yet ends up getting much higher scores on tests. How does increasing days do jack when people with LESS time still do better?
September 27th, 2009 at 8:17 pm
I’m a 1st year teacher making just over $36k a year. I come home absolutely drained from teaching 5th-12th graders all day. Unless my pay is going to be increased for the additional time in school, I am adamantly against this idea.
September 27th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
I am against this completely. I value my time with my children. They are children not robots. It is bad enough the summer homework assigned to them every year that takes every night of the summer to complete. These are our kids-yes education is important, but so is recreation. Everyone needs a break and time to relax. The school year is grueling my children sit in school 7 hours a day, they spend the balance of their night doing homework and studying. Now you want to take away their rest and un time to just be a kid. If this happens, you can’t bet I will pull my children ouot of school and home school them. This country is a mess, no jobs, everyone losing their homes, now you want to screw up our kids! NOWAY OBAMA
September 27th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
ok adding schhol is not going to help anything. getting home later and going to school an extra day each week will only add to stress because this is already adding to the trenmendous work load highschoolers have, there are some students that don’t make stellar grades but that is for lack of trying. kids that make good grades and try hard should not be punished. also what about for highschoolers who have jobs after school to save money for college? they would have no time for sports or anything all because obama wants too add time to school to make us smarter than China? kids need the weekends and summers to relax, not to be further stressed out. this should be a parental choice not up to one man to decide the lives for all the US children. It is riducolus and I absolutely DO NOT agree!
September 27th, 2009 at 10:52 pm
I love my time with my child also, but more education is the best idea I have heard of in a long time!!! Extending the school year a month, and each school day by a hour or even two…….. Every school district is different, I read one person complaining about summer home work, my daughter wishes she had summer home work, she gets bored, and if we had the older kids in school more, at least here in Cleveland Ohio, there would be alot less trouble on the streets, with the gangs and terrony the older kids provide in my neighborhood……… And Sherri, Our schools have been screwed up for more than 2 decades, when they started forced busing back in 79, that was suppose to be for mixing people, so everyone got to know everyone, of different races religions and ethnic backgrounds, not to put 1 or 2 white kids in a class of 35 black kids, or 2 or 3 black kids in a class of 35 white kids, raceism, in Cleveland has gotten worse and worse, Now they put kindergarden children in schools that go to the 8th grade, do you want your kindergardener seeing older kids all over each other in the hall ways…. I didnt……..and the language and racial sler’s, and the lack of any knowledge being passed on too our children from teachers that cant control up too 40 kids, by her self…….. OUR SCHOOLS NEED REVAMPED, STARTING WITH STRAIGHTENING OUT, ELEMENTARY, AND HIGH SCHOOLS AND PUTTINGBACK JR HIGH, ELIMINATING, RACIUM, LOWERING CLASS SIZES, ADDING TO THE SCHOOL DAY AND SCHOOL YEAR………. YOUR GO OBAMA!!!!!!!!!
September 27th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
As a junior in high school,
We can’t finish our homework as it is, with everything else we do (extracurriculars, etc).
All I see this doing is increasing the number of obese Americans. More time in school= less time to do homework= less time to spend outdoors, with family, staying in shape…
September 28th, 2009 at 12:55 am
I think this should be about quality over quantity. Longer school hours may mean kids have more time to sit and memorize facts, etc. It doesn’t mean they will be prepared to come up with new innovative ideas or be more interested in the topic they are studying.
Yes, the Japanese school system is stricter and more difficult (my Japanese gf has told me stories about going through it) but the Japanese lack the ability to create innovative ideas or technologies and can only merely copy ideas or technologies that were created by others. The free time to be child may just make all the difference and give American kids the edge over everyone else. It may give them the ability to really think about an issue or topic from their own point of view and come up with an innovative or creative solution.
If we can’t change the way we teach and actually make it more interesting or engaging for kids then I don’t see the point of longer hours in school. You will just end up with a generation of kids who are burned out before they have even entered college or the workforce.
September 28th, 2009 at 1:43 am
This is absurd… In my humble opinion, these are the benefits weighed against the many reasons that it’s not worth it/wouldn’t work. bear in mind, many of these have been said before.
PROS: Would possibly increase the level of education, assuming students don’t give up and drop out, and that they can conceivably gain anything from 9 hours of tedium per day…
CONS: Stress, widespread lack of faith in the president, damage to economy (through summer events and afterschool programs), more high school dropouts, massive retirement of teachers, broken spirits, lack of family time, and a less rounded education in general (due to less opportunity for out of school activities).
In short, F__K that, just pay teachers more and allocate more money to education as a whole. Yes, I am a student (14 years old) myself, I just decided to dot my i’s and cross my t’s in the hopes that people who care about that take it seriously.
September 28th, 2009 at 7:16 am
Uhm, who voted for this guy?
My school runs 8:13 to 3:08. We have three minutes between classes, and 20 minute lunch. With homework, tedious classes, and simple shortage of effort, we’ll drop out and home school ourselves.
September 28th, 2009 at 8:02 am
this is dumb proposal
September 28th, 2009 at 8:16 am
Let me ask a question about this little proposal. What will happen when everyone dropout of school and there is no one to teach. What will you do then Mr. Obama?
When every drops out who will be there to teach. If Mr. Obama were to extend these school days to and shorten summer vacation by twenty days so I ask how is our education going to go up without any students. So what are you going to have the country teach if more than a third of students in every school dropout as an example for that with every third dropping out it will just make the economy worst?
September 28th, 2009 at 9:21 am
Wow! Obama is really out of the loop. First of all, does he and Arne Duncan understand that schools are not free? Look at California, for heavens sake. They are cutting teachers left and right, upping class sizes. This is happening everywhere. Schools are cutting and even getting rid of sports, drama, and all extra-curricular activities. Now, he wants to add time to the school year? WHERE IS THE MONEY GOING TO COME FROM!?!??!
Also, many, many schools in this country do not have air conditioning. Is he going to air condition these buildings? Ever try to teach a room full of 30 2nd graders in a building with no air conditioning and it is 95 degrees outside?
Obama has turned into a cartoon. I voted for the guy!
September 28th, 2009 at 9:21 am
The countries he’s referring to are communist countries. Do we really want to lower ouurselves to that level? The problem is not bad teachers or too few schools hours. The problem is what the democrats have created with this welfare system, too much government control and too little citizen accountability. People can rely on the government to pay their bills, buy their food, force employers to hire them and make excuses for why they do the things they do. Every bad habit is becoming a medical issue (alcoholism, addiction, pediphilia, etc). All of this to say, the problem is not school, by creating all the “welfare” programs, we have given birth to the laziest country, not the dumbest. Addendum: I am all for a revised system that provides for people who are really in need…senior citizens who built this nation, physically or mentally handicapped, etc.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:09 am
Obamas plan for lengthening school days is not necessary. He need to stop comparing us to other countries. We have enough school days. It is pointless, very pointless to extend school hours.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:20 am
Hey Mia Lindsey, you need to check your words. The problem lies not with the teachers. The problem lies with the parents. I am a teacher and I work hard to educate my students. I admit there are some garbage teachers. However, the problem lies with the parents who dont discipline, or make their kids study. We cant make kids study at home. If we could teach them everything just in the classroom alone, then we would be miracle workers. But contrary to popular belief, it also takes parent involvment to be succesful. The problem is that most parents today want their children to be rarely seen and never heard.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:25 am
Hey Christal, you would love this because you sound like one of those welfare parents, I would wager money you are. THis means more time away from your kids, and more you time. Your garbage.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:44 am
I wonder if he also realizes that extending the day and school year itself means increasing taxes. In order for schools to run, they still need to have electricity as well as teacher’s pay. There will surely need to be an increase.
One more reason I didn’t vote for Obama. Now I’m shaking my head and saying “I told you so” to people regretting their choice.
Sure, you can compare us to Japan…but does anyone realize how many kids there contemplate suicide because of the enormous amount of stress placed upon them to perform well? Granted much of that is a cultural thing, but do we really need to be pushing more on our children?
I agree our education system is sorely lacking, but much of that has to do with the student’s home life. If you aren’t raised to give a damn about making something of yourself, why will more school make it any better? Especially when half the teachers don’t care either?
September 28th, 2009 at 10:57 am
I’m really getting tired of this guy. He reallly has no clue about teachers, or doctors, or nurses. This guy isn’t in touch with the people. I have been to public school, Private school, and am now homeschooled for my senior year in high school so let me give you my perspective. In public school I sit there for seven hours a day and I was BORED because we went over the same stuff for the kids who either didn’t care or needed help of didn’t speak english. I would get so frustrated sitting there and not being able to learn so for high school I went to private school which is only required to have school for 175 days. It was a better educational standered, but for varies reasons I left and am home school for about 3-4 hours and I learn more than ever! Honestly a few days doesn’t make a diffrence. My cousin is a student techer and she isn’t allowed to say no to the students so they can write english projects in Spanish or Russian and she has to dumb down the test for certain students. The hours and days isn’t the issue. Its the kids! I couldn’t learn because people would at up or didn’t care. Making the days longer would do nothing for anyone.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Adding more days and more money to a broken system will yield nothing – well, except more wasted tax payer dollars. Americans need alternatives in education – All Americans – not just RICH Americans (e.g. Kennedys, Clintons, Obamas).
Read more at: http://conservativetm.blogspot.com/2009/02/21-phoenix-rising.html
September 28th, 2009 at 10:59 am
i dont agreee with this because we the students will ot have anytime to study or do homework and some people want to spend time with their children so no i dont agree with this i think this is one of the dummiest stunts he has pulled yet……….and we are more advanced than the other countries in book sense so what does it matter. omg this not good and as us students our vote should count and we should vote on this so ppl plaese vote against this cause the drop out rate will increase and everything so if he wants the U.S. students to get educated he needs to leave it like it is
September 28th, 2009 at 11:58 am
I dont like him because he is black
September 28th, 2009 at 11:59 am
i say that this should never happen because students have stuff to do like go to there work, homework, activity, practice, and ect. the more we spend in school the more homework we have in when we get home we would be to tired that we cant do our other chores at home. but for the little childern they would love to but they would get tired too of all that playing outside and they would get tired of just sitting in that HARD chair
September 28th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
This is a terrible, If so many kids are dropping out already, what makes you think adding more school days/hours would make it any better? It’s not the amount of time we spend in school but the efforts that the teachers give in order to help us succeed. Most teachers don’t even do their job correctly and do not care about the student body enough. When teachers see a student that isn’t trying, they give up on that student, and do not even try to talk with that student, but they do in fact put that student down, making them feel even worse.
September 28th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
This is rediculous! Being a fellow student I know that I would not want a longer school day. First of all it would limit time for after school activities. Also, I am already tired after a normal school day, so a longer school day would take an even worse toll on students. Finally, many students would get bored with the extra material, and it just wouldn’t be worth it!
September 28th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
OK, I’ve read MOST of your guy’s replies. I’m appalled by how many of you voted for him, thinking his “change” for America was a great idea. See, I was only a “C” student, meaning I did the least amount of work in school to pass. Who knew I would be able to look at this guy and say he’s full of crap. he who is “smart”, has an education… he who is “not smart” makes the rest of the world run better. Thank you for telling Me, that I was stupid for NOT voting for Obama… Now… whos stupid?
September 28th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
In the state of Michigan we should first focus on getting enough money to run the schools we have. Our budget has been reduced 40% in the first quarter. 6 schools in one district closed in our county. Overcrowding and insufficient funds to replace old technology, books and computers. Let’s start with the right educators and tools to help students succeed. Where are we getting the money for extended schooling?
September 28th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
We’re pumping out a nation of C students. If we don’t try to compete in education then we’re going to have to sell the little stupid stevens off to factories to work for pennies a day. Education leads to innovation innovation leads to new industry and better paying jobs. Poor academic performance leads to relying on foreign ingenuity. Which leads to less exports a lower standard of living and eventual decline to third world status. We end up with an america that runs like walmart. Sure walmart is the richest corporation in the world, but everything they sell is made in china and their employees in america are paid crap and on average have a highschool or lower education. We want an america that runs more like microsoft. They encourage educated employees with high salaries make their own product and pull in money that goes back into america.
September 28th, 2009 at 3:57 pm
Whenever government messes with education, they get the same dysfunctionality as Congress.
In the 1950s, Russia launched the first ever satellite, Sputnik. The US government panicked that Russia was ahead of the US in technology. The first thing that the government determined was that the Russian kids spend twice as much time in classrooms as the US kids. They decided that is what it takes to create engineers and scientists for the US, so they hired the President of Harvard University to tell them what to do…he said..double the classroom time. But wait…the teachers said..no way, not without a lot more money, and the school boards said, no way, unless you give us a lot of money to pay for the schools, teachers, buses, utilities and then we have to give up our sports programs and other arts activities. So no one would buy it….until someone came up with a free way to get more school hours for the kids….it was HOMEWORK..which had never existed before. This was to let the school day be devoted to serious classroom teaching, and the exercises over the lessons would be done at home for about three hours of kids homework.
Did not work at all….but that was the Government plan that happened with the Government PANICED and threw a solution into the mill without any sense. Just like the Department of Education never existed before either…and you can blame all the turmoil in education on that group.
Obama has no idea about schools and education, nor does the Secy of Education. It is different all over our states, and with different income and social cultures in our nation. Longer days is not better. When did having Congress stay longer in session result in better government or laws?
This is totally another way that the Obama crowd can impose their will upon the people….and since the Feds have the money they take from our taxes, they have the big stick over schools.
Cheaper to go to private schools. Better education too. The teachers are in the deal too because of the Teacher’s Union….they are today, part of the problem, not part of the solution.
September 28th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
I agree with the longer school term. No reason not to, however, you’re going to have a lot of tourist businesses fighting this one. As to the longer school day, I say no way. Kids attention spans are pushed to the limit already. Kids need time to play and be kids. After 40 years in education, I think I can say that with some degree of certainty.
September 28th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
i think this is pure CRAP! we dont need more school,we need better educatoinal tools. the teachers and kids are already swamped with work (from school and home). how are the older kids suposed to stay at their jobs and do longer hours at school? how are the teachers going to get any sleep after being at work all day,then going home to do more work and still go grocery shopping,pay bills etc.? how are children going to interact with their family,if they never see them? my husband is in the military,and when hes not being sent off…he still only gets to see his daughter ONE HOUR A DAY before she goes to school. how can someone not even think about the effect this will have on a child emotionally?! and what about the parents? how are we suposed to rearange our shedules? so that we can get our kids from school to daycare. because some parents will be going to work when their kids are getting out of school (with this new school schedule). and what about the drop out rates? kids already skip school,what does he think is going to happen if he makes them go longer? HIGHER DROP OUT RATES. he really is an idiot if he thinks this plan is going to work. i am not kidding when i say obama is just another hitler!!!
September 28th, 2009 at 4:52 pm
I CAN STAND THE LONGER SVHOOL YEAR. BUT NOT THE LONGER SCHOOL DAYS!!!!!!!!!!! HE CAN MAKE THE SCHOOL YEAH AS LONG AS HE WANTS. BUT PEOPLE HAVE SPORTS AFTERSCHOOL FOR LIKE TWO HOURS SO THAT MEAN YOU WONT GET HOME TILL LIKE 8 THEN U WILL HAVE TO DO LIKE 5 HOURS OF HOMEOWRK! OBAMAS GREAT BUT HE IS GOING TO MAKE THE COUNTRY GO IN CHAOS!!!!!
September 28th, 2009 at 6:01 pm
I am a 7th grade’s student, i don’t like this plan. obama wants to add the third part of united states’ school year. i think that I talk for every studient at U.S.A it’s unfairly.
i am going to give you another option that is add a litle part of the 60 days like 10 days on one year and the next year not and this is my option.
thank you
September 28th, 2009 at 6:30 pm
As a average senior in high school I personally would like to have extra days for school. I don’t understand why we need two months of summer. I personnally get bored after the first few weeks and want to go back. Right now i have easy classes and I am craving more rigorous classwork. Reading the comments I am starting to believe that Americans now believe that is it all right for us to be in last place. We used to have pride in being number 1 and now we are settling for second. I also believe that kids drop out no matter what and adding more time won’t do anything to change that.
September 28th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Obama would like to catch up to the number of school days in South Korea, as well as their excellent scores. Did he forget that the suicide rate in Korea is extremely high due to the stress put on these kids to do so well in school? It’s not the school days that need to be extended, it’s the support that the children get at home. If the importance of education is stressed from the beginning it will make a HUGE impact on their success in school. Make the parents responsible, too, not just the teachers.
September 28th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
I can’t believe that Obama is trying to even pass making the school days longer or the year longer for that matter. I teach all day kindergarten and the poor kids can hardly stay awake when it comes aroung 2:30pm. The school feeds them a free breakfast and feeds them lunch. We teach the kids letters, sounds, words, numbers, addition, science kits, and social studies thrughout the 7 1/2 hours a day. These poor kids are only 5years old. I have two high school students who are doing great in school but they are working to death on homework, projects, and studying for the next test. We are giving our students what they need to be successful in the time that they are in school. If every child puts forth the effort, they will succeed. Also here in Delaware, our Govenor took a 2 1/2 percent paycut from every state employee this year and our healthcare went up another 2 percent. The state can’t afford the teachers pay now how will they ever support more money for salaries. Also the building I work in was built in 1921, it leaks, wooden floors are unlevel, and other problems exist. Our district is one of the poorest in the county and I can’t imagine this ever passing in our state. Every year the goverment comes back to the schools finance department looking for funds to take back so I am afraid that if the funds were given from the federal government it still will not be spent wisely.
September 28th, 2009 at 7:14 pm
No way in hell am I going to allow my kids to spend more time WITH THE GOVERNMENT than with their parents!!! Is this some sort of plan of theirs to brainwash my child into becoming a robot?
September 28th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
I agree we should not have any extended school time because it takes away time we have with our family and ,making the world a better place
September 28th, 2009 at 7:42 pm
HOW ABOUT WE WORRY ABOUT THE 50,000 SOLDIERS DYING EVERYDAY!
September 28th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
[...] Just before logging off to go to bed last night, I checked the headlines and came across a story about President Obama wanting to extended the school day/year. According to what I read, it is [...]
September 28th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
Obama is not interested in better educated children – if he were he would break the monopoly on public education. Competition WILL make all schools better.
Obama is more interested as he said in “building a civilian army as well funded as the military”. Longer days with his curriculum are part of that strategy. On Sept. 8th his speech to nearly every child in America was altered when we found out he wanted to enlist childrens’ help for his socialist agenda. .His conservative speech was designed to get students and their parents to like him so they will accept his radical views later – Watch 11 yr old Quentin Cody’s speech to Obama here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0tf9LYSZ8I
September 28th, 2009 at 9:09 pm
I think our days here in the states are long enough. I’ve heard in Germany they get off at 1pm compared to our 3pm. This idea would mess up many of our students schedules and free time as well as their parents who have their work schedule set to be there by 3pm to get them picked up, fed, and home. If we want to see smarter children than we need to encourage them. Provide more choices for them to get active in their community. Teachers as well will lose their quality of education staying till 6pm-7pm and some will quit, others will not give 100% at such hours. Obama says that this is to make us smart like the other countries? Other countries have dedicated teachers, us….not so much. Just because were in school for another 2-3 hours doesn’t mean students will learn more, means they will lose their social time and cause higher drop out rates. I think this should remain as an option for schools to stay open till the night as a safe place for children to go to to study and get extra help but mandatory? No thank you Mr President.
September 28th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
I am a future teacher and have been a student teacher for some time now and I think this is a ridiculous attempt at a solution to the problem the education system in our country is currently in. Teachers should not have to work those kinds of hours and kids should not have to go to school that long. No one involved would have any life outside of school. Where would all of the extra money come from which would be needed for this to be possible come from? We are already in a national deficit that is larger than it has been in decades. Each year there are cutbacks in funding. It will not only take more money for teachers but also to keep the school running with heating,lights,air conditioning. What about the costs to students as in with the expense to after school activities such as athletics, theater, music and the arts? Or the expense to the social development of their beings, which is important. These are just a few of the issues present. It seems this will be a war that our country is about to embark on between the students, parents, teachers on one side and the president and his crownees or supporters on the other.
September 28th, 2009 at 11:33 pm
First off, all of the whining high school students who cannot compose a paragraph need to start worrying about the stress of not being able to pay bills due to a low paying job, not the stress of having to do a math assignment. Internet language counts – it is our only window of insight into your personality and intellect, and first impressions count. Your current high school workload is no worse than it was ten years ago, and no worse than it was twenty years ago. All of the adults in the room have been there – and reality and adulthood “suck” and are far more stressful than being in school. It is called having an internal work ethic and not being lazy.
That being said, extending the school day in my district would be a difficult task. I teach high school, and our day runs from 9 am to 3:45 pm, with sports and activities before and after school. Many parents work in D.C., and with the commutes there is less quality family hours available in the day. I as a music teacher am already at work from 8 am till 6 pm normally. With rehearsals, auditions, plays, ECAs, sports and everything else that goes with the responsibility of being an arts teacher, I would not appreciate having a 12 hour work day (and you know that there would be those of us who would run ourselves dry like this, because it is what is needed for our students. This is abusing our work ethic, assuming that we will continue to do the same services because we want to give students more opportunities. I hate having to tell myself “no stop, you aren’t getting paid for this”, but what value to do they place on our time?).
Your first teacher is your mother. Parents have a huge roll and influence on their kids – and I can tell the difference in students who have an active parent-child relationship and those who do not get as much motivation and help. Kids need that role modeling and quality time with mom and dad – it makes a huge difference in their performance at school. And we as teachers need to keep parents informed of what is going on and seek their help, because it takes a whole village to raise a child, so to speak.
Less pointless standardized test with rote memorization. More synthesis and higher learning like the work that is present in AP and IB classes. More community support making learning “cool”. More making students responsible for their own learning, and ready to have self-motivation in college.
September 29th, 2009 at 12:25 am
This is horrible! Ok, i’ll admit it, i am a student, but i don’t see why he is doing this? Instead of adding more school hours to each day, he should be concerned about taking A LOT of money out of circulation! God forbid I hit gold! I could buy the whole united states in about 50 years the way this is going! (exageration) I think that people like us should do something about this! My science teacher is also a farmer, after school he goes and feeds all of his animals, now think, how is he going to be able to do that, when he is at school untill 6 o’ clock. I will be looking for a job locally next year and how am I supposed to work? If I am a student, and I would like to get a job, and I have to wake up at 5am, go to school by 7am, stay untill 6 or 7pm and then work? Its possable, but no way would anyone ever be able to do that. I understand the need for education but I also understand the need for a stable economy. If Obama is so busy proposing things like this, how is he making even the slightest attempt to stablize or economy? Hmmm, ask yourself, do I want to be in school (or do I want my kids in school) for that many hours, then comming home to do homework, then doing it all over again. ARE WE FORGETTING THAT AMERICA HAS ONE OF THE HIGHEST OBESITY RATES IN THE WORLD! how are we going to get time to excersize ? Schools will loose some money, because they will be needing to serve two meals depending on the time of day that the school is open to. I bet his own two kids are begging him not to do that. SELF CORRECTION, it dosent matter to them, I can bet anyone any money that this will only affect public schools. NO WAY CAN THIS HAPPEN!
*by the way, I am only 13 years old, if I can understand this WHY CANT THE GOVERNMENT?!?!??!?!!!?!!
September 29th, 2009 at 1:01 am
[...] this year we reported that President Obama proposed longer school days, and recent buzz indicates he’s still at it. The President wants American children to [...]
September 29th, 2009 at 3:43 am
TO THE TEACHERS WHO VOTED FOR OBAMA.
I really hope you are realizing this is NOT the change or president we had hoped for. I guess when Obama talked about transparency, he was talking about exposing the CIA, because he surely has no transparency when it comes to rushing a bill.
(THE INFORMATION BELOW IS EASY TO VERIFY BY DOING A SEARCH ON GOOGLE!)
I have been trying to determine the rationale for why our govt. wants to control every aspect of our lives. I can tell you that the science czar, John Holdren, truly believes our planet is doomed if we continue on our current course. He seriously ponders ways that he can save the world: controlling the population via putting “sterilants in welfare recipients drinking water”, and geo-engineering are 2 that he’s written about.
Obama constantly states “we cannot continue on our current course” and rattles away at the U.N. about how “industrialized nations are responsible for global climate changes that are causing flooding, famine, and disappearing coastal villages in developing nations”. If these scholars really believe that they are “saving the planet” by controlling us, then they would stop at nothing to achieve their end goal. Which is………….?
How far might they go? They sound a lot like the Khmer Rouge, the radical Communist movement in Cambodia in the 1970’s. These communists slaughtered over a million “middle class” (teachers/bankers/doctors/lawyers) people because they knew that the middle class were already spoiled into their comfortable ways of life and they would rebel against this communist movement. http://www.nytimes.com/1997/08/03/weekinreview/in-cambodia-a-middle-classless-society.html
There is enough evidence out of this administration that I seriously believe global warming is the reason behind their seize of power. Again, if you believe you are saving the masses and future generations by mandating “a set emissions rate per capita” (something John Holdren stated needed to be done in his Global Climate Disruption lecture), you will stop at nothing to accomplish that goal.
Example on how my theory fits everything govt is doing:
1.) Govt could care less about running trillions and trillions in debt……not because it needed to be done in the name of “boosting” the economy, but because we need to bankrupt as many as possible to decrease their carbon footprint. They will bankrupt us into poverty where we will leave the carbon footprint of an animal. But they will not lead by example. Most of us probably leave about 10% of the carbon footprint as Al Gore, Nancy Pelosi, or B. Obama.
2.) Take a good look at where stimulus money went: Billions to weatherize federal buildings and govt subsidized communities. Billions for solar upgrades. Billions for public transportation. (eventually to stop the practice of one car equaling one commuter). Billions to update our electric grids. Billions to initiate the healthcare system that our govt. will control.
3.) Taking control of health care……not to save 30 million people. But so they may control population. Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel (Rham’s brother) is a bioethicist. He’s openly talked about how the emphasis of medical care needs to be “for the good of the community, not what’s good for the individual”. If you’ve reached 50 or so years old, you’ve already been able to live out your younger years. It’s not fair that you suck up so much money in medical costs. It takes away from those 30 million people that can’t get care.
Check out govt’s own website for their Comparitive Effectiveness Research Panel started with the help of $1.1 Billion dollars of stimulus money. This panel of govt officials will be responsible for health care research and policy making. (Interesting that this was ALREADY IN PUT IN PLACE BY WAY OF THE STIMULUS BILL. You know, the one that was supposed to get Americans back to work. http://www.hhs.gov/recovery/programs/os/cerbios.html
Also here’s a pretty enlightening article by a Dr. who actually pulled up HR 3200 on line and studied it for a while: http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/janda.asp
4.) Obama wants a civilian national force because when people understand the MAGNITUDE of where we are headed, there will be a revolt. Do you see it starting already?
5.) Oh and the extended school day, is another way to take our children out of their homes. Govt. is in charge of acedemic and moral education of our children now.
What an attack on the rights of parents!!!!
Please, I’m begging all of you to see that we are not heading down the right road.
September 29th, 2009 at 7:04 am
I am a teacher and I completely agree with having a longer school year!!! The amount of time that teachers spend reviewing last years objectives or reteaching objectives that the students have forgotten over the summer is ridiculous!! Research shows how terrible a three month break is for our children. Most children go home for the summer without opening a book, solving math equations, or doing anything educational!
However, all teachers would need to be compensated for the extra days. We need smaller class sizes and we need more professional development plans for new teachers. If we would just restructure the school schedule, we wouldn’t have to spend billions of dollars to compensate teachers. We could have shorter, more frequent breaks throughout the year.
We do not need a three month break where children go home to a home that is not always safe, or they do not have parent support! Some children receive their best meals, love, support, and care from school than they do from home. Some of my students look forward to coming to school because it’s a safe haven. We need to think of the students first! What is best for our children????
September 29th, 2009 at 7:33 am
those countries have a higher suicide rate….
September 29th, 2009 at 7:39 am
how about before we go extending the school day or year we fix the time we have? We barely ge anything done as is. To much mony is spend on programs that look good on paper and earn the government aplause but actualy waste time in the classroom. Programs like north carolinas now thankfully deceased DIBELS program, which cost a good bit of money and generated nothing but “hey look at us, were acomplishing stuf” statistics. If teachers were actualy alowed to teach than maybe we would be beter prepared for a global economy.
September 29th, 2009 at 8:17 am
Is this President a control freak? This is not a decision for the President of the US to make. The school year and days are set by the states and local school districts. This is not in the purview of the office of the Presidency.
Wish Obama would stick to the duties of the President of the United States and spend his time studying the needs of the country, especially US history and foreign affairs, and stop acting like he is in control of every little minute detail of our lives.
We can and do handle this locally, without his interference.
Each state and local district has been debating the merits of this and similar issues for several years, and it is their role to deal with this issue. This just sounds like another one of his Union backers is pushing for something and he is jumping on the bandwagon on their behalf.
September 29th, 2009 at 8:52 am
this is the worst he could call because i have to help around the house.and thats not good when u have homework the day is long enough.so i have lots of things to do this is not cool
September 29th, 2009 at 8:53 am
he is insane
September 29th, 2009 at 8:54 am
no long years and no long days
September 29th, 2009 at 8:58 am
why give longer school days when there is work to be done at home.
September 29th, 2009 at 8:58 am
Yay
September 29th, 2009 at 9:01 am
i dont know why he is doing this. this is crazy he doesn’t need longer school days or years. i am a student and i think 3:00 is long their is no point. so thank you.
September 29th, 2009 at 9:02 am
Boo, u make aaron mad
September 29th, 2009 at 10:16 am
The devil is a lie you think im about to stay in school for my summer. I dont think so, I will drop out if that happeneds. Why do you thing teens drops out because they are tired of school. Especially when you go to a school like mine you would never wanna come to school. To much homework, teachers that dont teach none of the teacher dont teach they all need to be replaced with smart one.
OBAMA IF YOU WANNA DO SOMETHING START WITH VARNADO HIGH SCHOOL IN WASHINGTON PARSIH.
September 29th, 2009 at 2:34 pm
his on crack! obama needs to go be a presidint at korea …like 4reals if he wants us to like go to school longer he should try it to see if he likes it!! okay?? instead of cutting are summer VACATION! he should ADD TO IT!!! okay…
September 29th, 2009 at 4:57 pm
I am actually in school to become a teacher and although I applaud our present Presiden’t’s effort in enriching our students and our schools, I think he is taking the wrong approach as well. I think longer days will result in less engaged time and students will become bored, tired, and distracted. They already worry about going home and being out of school, if we make them go even an hour more they will not want to go to school or enjoy learning. Second, if he lengthens the school year and takes out summer break, what do children have to motivate them to do good in school? They have enjoyed summer break ever since I can remember and even before that, if we take away summer break, you will have an increased amount of drop outs, burn outs, and annoyed students as well as teachers who burn out and dont do a good job and then eventually lots of teachers quitting and taking up other careers. Why mess up a good thing? We need more quality and more money put into materials and programs, not into making students miserable by keeping them longer. Kids need to be kids and yes they need to learn, but we are ahead of Japan and Korea in more than just two subjects. I hope this does not get approved.
September 29th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
i think it is a wonderful idea i hope it happens!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
September 29th, 2009 at 8:22 pm
[...] In 1 on September 30, 2009 at 1:22 am In this recent article,“Obama Proposes Longer School Days,” I felt the comments below it were an accurate depiction of how opposed we are about changing our [...]
September 29th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
I’ve lived and taught junior high school in Japan for two years. The kids sadly have no free time – not much home life to speak of – very sad. They may be in school longer but that doesn’t mean that they make the best use of their time. I believe the amount of hours our kids spend in school is just right and any more would be detrimental to their health and well-being. There are lots of options for parents who want to give their children more exposure to all kinds of learning during the summer as well. It’s a time of discovery and yes, relaxation. As adults we Americans are some of the hardest-workers in the world – at least our children should be able to have happy memories of lazy hazy days of summer. There is a time for work and a time for play. Ok, rant over.
September 29th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
The reason kids aren’t learning is the teachers spend all their time teaching them how to pass those required tests. Get rid of the tests and teach them what they’re suppose to learn, like U.S. History, World History, Science, Health,Music,Art, English(yes, I said English),and Math(all kinds) and Home Economics and Wood Shop. These topics are far more important than studing for the “tests”. If the kids started school on the day “after” Labor Day and only got 2 days off for Thanksgiving, 1 week for Christmas(and yes, I said Christmas), and NO days off for Easter(not Spring break), then finish school on the last day of May. That would give the kids 189 days of school filled with good material plus days filled with field trips, real ones not going to the mall trips or to movies. Trips to Museums, factories, outside along the shores & the woods/forests. Outside with nature where one can really learn. Don’t need to be in a classroom to learn. A farm is an excellent place to learn. We as America don’t need to be like other countries. We just need to step up to the plate & do our best at what we can do. Each one of us have God given gifts that we should use not only for ourselves but for others. Let’s step up to the plate America and show obama we don’t need him or his ideas.
September 30th, 2009 at 6:08 am
Why does everyone seem to hate this idea. i think it’s a good one. Now obviously people here are complaining about making the day longer, fine, then how about a longer school year. you guys are also complaining about getting crappier teachers instead of better ones. Teachers also have to go to school and learn the materials (I hope) and how to teach students. And yes people, we are behind compared to other countries.
I’m a supporter of this plan. Sure people are gonna start bitching about it, there’s always someone anyways.
September 30th, 2009 at 6:47 am
I think President Obama has addressed an issue that really makes a good point. My son is in 6th grade, 95% of his friends cannot spell, read at a level I think is a 1st grade level, for math they count on their fingers and believe pulling a passing grade (70) on a test or quiz deserves recognition. These are children who can play video games, or football and know all the ins and outs but when it comes to school work it takes a back seat. Is it the teachers, perhaps, maybe certain students need to be taught the way in which they can easily learn. Is it the parents? My opinion, ABSOLUTELY! I don’t think this issue would be on the table right now if all parents did their job. My son has to do homework before anything else. He has to study for tests/quizzes and I test him on all the material before he can do anything else. If extra credit is given out, he does the extra credit. Over the 10 week summer break he gets 60 minutes a day (5 days a week) of material he already learned during the school year. It’s just a refresher, so he retains what he learned and then about 3 weeks before school starts, I might dip into something he can expect to learn for that grade so he might be a step ahead. My son’s average is usually 100%, this year so far his average in most classes are 100 and 97 in Social Studies, with honestly no real major effort. He gets to see his friends and go bike riding daily, play tennis, soccer practices, and religion one night a week. He’s an average tween and does all that the other kids do, text, computer, mp3, video games, tv, hanging out, biking, tennis, soccer, football, etc. and has commitments in the evening for religion or soccer, etc. He’s not superior to anyone, he just takes his work seriously and puts his best foot forward. He never forgets what he is taught because he reviews his materials frequently. He’s an avid reader and therefore his spelling and vocabulary are never a problem for him. If every parent put a greater effort and time investment into their children I believe we would see a huge improvement in scores. As parents we have been told to read to our children and when your child starts to read, have your child read to you. It’s simple, turn off the tv or whatever else and invest 20 minutes a day to reading. Have an older sibling read to the younger child and both children will benefit at the same time. Spend 5 minutes a day with math facts. These little changes can have a huge impact on your child along with healthy eating and physical activity daily.
September 30th, 2009 at 8:06 am
Obama’s completely out of his mind…….why should we go to school longer….. thats NOT FAIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! why the heck should we have to spend time in boring old school every day….people nedd a social life too ya know!!!! summer should be longer…..this plan sucks
September 30th, 2009 at 8:41 am
[...] — She Started It @ 1:41 PM Laura at 11D asks what we think about Obama’s desire to increase the length of the school day, and shorten [...]
September 30th, 2009 at 9:47 am
I dislike this idea . School is importent but i mean dang man im 16 i go to school but i still got a job i got bills to pay and many other things to do . I play football and if u did that there would be no time to do recreation. Also homework would be impossible to do cause of all the things kids do after school. Education may be importent but my family works all year but for the summer and i look forwadr to the summer so i can spend time with them if you were to do something like that i would prolly drop out so i could see my family.So just remeber im not the only one who feels this way about this.
P.S I like school but not that much have a nice day go Tebow.
September 30th, 2009 at 9:52 am
longer days man we should shorten them but really we should spend more hours and school and more days out of school
September 30th, 2009 at 9:54 am
obama is an idiot if he thinks people are gonna agree with his stupid plan for extending the school year.but getting new technology for students like laptops so they don’t have to carry all the heavy text books WALKING to AND from school every day of the week.OBAMA IS AN IDIOT.
September 30th, 2009 at 9:55 am
IN WAYS I COULD HELP BUT IN MANY OTHER WAYS IT HAS A BAD EFFECT ON PEOPLE.LIKE MY LIL CUZ HE HAS NO TIME TO DO ANYTHING BUT HOME WORK ALREADY I MEAN YEAH I GOT A LOT OF HOME WORK BUT HES ONLY IN THE THIRDGRADE WITH AS MUCH HOMEWORK AS I GOT .IF U MADE THE SCHOOL DAYS LONGER MORE KIDS WOULD DROP OUT JUST SO THEY WOULD HAVE TIME FOR OTHER THINGS AND SO THEY WOULDNT HAVE TO HAVE ALL THE PRESSURE ON THERE SHOULDERS AND THEY WOULD HAVE WAY TO MANY THINGS TO WORRIE ABOUT. SO DONT DO IT MAN . IM OUT PEASE!!!!!
September 30th, 2009 at 10:40 am
we do not like obama. the school year DOES NOT need to be extended. who care’s how much time them chinese kids spend in school. obama can kiss our foot.
September 30th, 2009 at 10:44 am
NO BAMA NO BAMA!!
September 30th, 2009 at 10:45 am
THATS STUPID.. I already hate school why make it longer?? And Taylor County High is right COMPLETLY..
P.s. I go there too!
And we know there grammer is wrong but they are still right 100%
September 30th, 2009 at 10:51 am
Did Obama go to school in Japan? I dont think so he went to the same schools with the same schedules and curriculum that we do today. So we are tired of all this bull crap about competing with other countries. We live in America not japan not Finland but America. And if obama dont like it he can leave to Japan.
September 30th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
ok this is the worst idea ive ever heard. were heading to a socialist gov. first off, hes acting like there are no farms left in the us. second, we go to school almost 7 hours a day. thats plenty. thirdly, who cares what all other countries do, we have the best quality of life because of how we are now. fourth and most important, you have to let a child have a childhood. summer is a major part in childhood, and if you took that away, all a child has to remember is school, no vacations, no fun times with friends, just school. school is not the most important thing in life, there are also things you must do out of school to better your quality of life in the future. im a junior in high school, and i know how it is to sit in a 70 minute class 5 times a day. it gets old, and if that becomes all day every day, where is our time to have fun, enjoy being a kid, making memories of our childhood? i love hearing my grandpa and dad tell stories about them growing up, hunting in the woods, things they did when they were kids, the fun they had. i want my children to tell those storys to their children. what is the meaning of life if all you know is book work? im in the scouts, go camping almost every weekend of the year, and have seen and learned so many things most people will never get the opportunity to. how will i go camping if we have school on the weekends?
September 30th, 2009 at 7:09 pm
Wow he makes it sound school is wonderful place to be as it is. Well he is wrong. HE doesn’t have to get up every morning at 6AM and get ready. HE doesn’t have to wait in freezing weather for 20 minutes for the bus to finally come then another 45 minutes on a freezing bus to get to the school. HE doesn’t have to sit in a classroom and listen to a teacher DRONE ON FOR AN HOUR. I can barely stand school as it is right now let alone going on weekends, extra hours and about 1 month less summer vacation. How about HE can put himself through NO vacation time at all for 11 months of the year then we can see how HE feels about it. We are the United States of America, we are not Japan, we are the United Stated of America NOT The Netherlands. Maybe we wouldn’t be losing our jobs to foreigners if HE would make a stricter immigration policy!
September 30th, 2009 at 10:10 pm
I’ll drop out. So many hours of school is pointless enough considering most of the teachers I have are grumpy and don’t know how to teach itself.
October 1st, 2009 at 1:25 pm
When I first heard of Obama’s plan to extend the school year, I was taken aback. However, reading the posts that were typed here by the product of our education system helped make up my mind. I am in full support of this proposal. More education cannot be a bad thing.
The children making most of the posts sound like lazy, spoiled, ignorant brats. There were 2 or 3 intelligent posts that opposed this plan. I see the points made by them. However, most of you cannot even form a complete sentence. You don’t know the difference between it’s and its. It’s pathetic.
The rest of the world when talking to their children uses our country as a warning as to what may happen if you become lazy. The decline in American intelligence as a whole is obvious to anyone that takes the time to actually look. Do you want to know why you are seeing so many Indian students at our Ivy League schools? It’s because YOU can’t compete for the best education in your own country.
You whine and moan about hating school and working hard. Do you realize how many people fought and died for you to have the right to be educated? If you do, do you care or are you too spoiled to appreciate it? I am proud to live in a country where the importance of education is not just acknowledged, it is given as a RIGHT. Why take this gift of freedom and enlightenment and spit on it?
I am ashamed of this generation of students. I know they will reply with vulgarity along the lines of “f*** you”, thus proving my point. Wake up. Obama is trying to help YOU become able to compete with the Chinese (who incidentally are becoming the world’s #1 super power passing us by a mile). The only way to compete is to work hard. Are you not able to or are you just unwilling to do it.
In extending the school day, some concessions would have to be made. Teachers should not assign as much homework. However, they won’t need to because you will be spending more time on subjects at school. Teachers should become better at what they do. Quality seriously needs to be addressed. Parents should be held accountable for making sure their children aren’t over committed. Teacher salary should go up if they are working more hours. This will take money. At least Obama is willing to invest in your future rather than the future of children in Iraq.
Think hard before you react to this. I’m done being part of a generation of lazy crybabies. Is that how you want to go down, as the generation that lost the American edge? If you don’t care about that, I fear for the future of our nation.
October 1st, 2009 at 3:03 pm
I think obama needs to look at the bigger picture. There are WAY bigger promblems going on in America then the education in our schools. Kids are already overworked and taking classes ive never even heard of. Honors this excelerated that pre college courses! kids need the summer to relax and have fun, KIDS NEED TIME TO BE KIDS. The education department has grown trumdecly in the last 20 years my daughter knows things i was never taught in school, once again Obama needs to focus on the more important issues going on today instead of worrying little kids.
October 1st, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Dear President Obama,
I have two responses to the idea that us kids go to longer.
1.I think it’s a good thing that we should have a longer school year because,if we need extra time to turn something in at the end of the six weeks we might be able to turn it in.Also, we could have more time to take our AR(accelarated reader) tests.Oh!,by the way my name is Kelsey Elaine Saltz.I am 13 years old.I live in Chilhowie,Virginia. I go toChilhowie Middle School.I am in the 7th grade. I’m not that good in Life Science or Math. I love to read.write,sing,bake,learning Spanish,and to have Civics and Economy homework! I guess that sounds pretty wierd coming from a teenager.
2. I also don’t think it good to take our Summer away from us. I mean I think I speak for almost every kid that goes to school is fair to take our only time in the years that we can visit someone special to us that may live in a different state or something. I mean that’s our special time.And that’s also the only time I can see,and talk to my boyfriend Sean Barns. He’s 15.lives in Marion, Virginia.Well anyways THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH for taking the time to read this.It means soooo much to me.
Sincerely,
Kelsey Elaine Saltz!!
P.S.
What do you think about coming to my school to talk about what to do with our lives?
October 1st, 2009 at 8:59 pm
You guys complain but you are the ones who elected him as your president. Longer school years isnt the problem with this, its the fact that he’s trying to put the country in a better image & trying to compete with other nations.
Most other nations are not as technology advanced as us nor do they have a great militia.
Just because kids get more education, that doesnt guarantee that they will not drop out, or rebel against having to put up with more time in school to decide to not go to college.
October 1st, 2009 at 10:31 pm
if all these “people of other countries” are so much smarter than us… why do they all come here for their education ??? And has anyone stopped to think that this just may have been proposed by the “dual employed” parents who needs their kids to be taken care of longer so they can afford their beemers and lexus suv’s… when one parent is home to make sure the kids do their homework and study instead of myspacing, facebooking with their friends or playin video games maybe the kids will be smarter…
October 1st, 2009 at 10:47 pm
continuing with my last comment and trying not to be long winded.. im just trying to say that family values are different today then when we were “all farmers” now people worry more about their careers or their stock options more than they worry about raising their kids. let the illegal immigrant nanny take care of that.. and the ones who will berate this comment the most are probably the worst offenders… (psst… whats the date of ur kids b’day?)
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:07 am
um..WHY DO WE ALWAYS COPY ASIAN PEOPLE?
WHY NOT BRITISH PEOPLE?
THEY HAVE OLIVER SYKES SO THEYRE BETTER OKAI?
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:12 am
No child left behind… The problem is the entire nation is slowing down to make sure they don’t leave that child behind. Sure, give that child some extra attention and assistance, but not at the cost of thirty other children!!!! More schools (K-12) need accelerated classes; more programs that help children excel instead of waste time at mediocrity. Extending school hours is not the solution for “smarter” children. How about making the time they spend there more productive. Substitutes, who read a book while the class has “free-time”, open periods, etc. Children already spend too much time at school, and yet the come home and spend most the evening doing homework – ridiculous!! What are they doing in school?? Everyone who is/has ever attended public school knows what I’m talking about. Okay, OBAMA, you go ahead and send moms away to school, send children away to public daycare, oh I mean school, take away all financial benefits from the honest working class (THAT SUPPORTS THIS NATION) and you will witness the complete and utter disintegration of the family, respect, responsibility, love and the qualities that make America great!
October 2nd, 2009 at 7:55 pm
Im a student myself, and i belive that school is long enough in both year wise, and daily wise. When i get home from school, i get tons of homework. Eassays due next days, reports, Alegbra, intergers, and all of those. But then dont forget i also have American Studies, Science, and all those other requried subjects, then after school work, like builders club to help the enivorment, yearbook comminitee, and all those that lead up to highschool and collage creidts. I TOTALLY DISAGREE WITH THIS LAW. Obama has to realize that kids are doing way too much time in school already. Some parents dont even let their childern out at 5pm, Cause of the dark and such. and espeically for the younger kids, who need more sleep, and fun. Why would you put smaller kids working harder than they already can? Some kids even have after school jobs to help support families with money problems, were in a enconmy, and its not getting any better, just like obama promised. If school was longer, then kids would have to quit their jobs, and have no way to help their parents. 180 days of school is enough, over the summer, kids want to take a break from school, and enjoy. They spent over 10months in schoool, doing work, preparing for state test. Yes their kids that fail, and such, but that doesnt mean we should get blamed for their mistakes, its pretty much the teachers that dont help, their the carless ones, not us. If more schools were strict, then im pretty postive Kids wouldnt bring guns or have fights in school, disrespect teachers and more. I dont think its the wack hours and time in school, its the teachers that need to care, Do you really think they care about us? the teahcers are as worse as the kids, have you noticed how they’ve been using horriable language with us now ? and just really dont give a s*** about us ? Its not us. again. its the lack of careness of teachers, Yeah some kids like school, thats why their after school programs were they stay and help. I think if school was extended, and summer was cut off, More than 90% of the school would drop out. and its kinda bad for us, cause this just makes econmy worse, cause kids wouldnt get working papers, applications for collage or highschool, and wouldnt go no where in life, and thats cause they wouldnt do the time in school causes it too much, Familes need their childerns help, Childern have responsibilties in the house, and others, for parents that work, And what about parents who work and have babies in the housse? Do you realize that half the familes would have to quit their job just to take care of the baby, cause their own sibblings couldnt babysit? and half the parents dont trust daycares, or cant afford them? And then, Kids have saturday school already, who attend relgion, or speical launguaee class . Their would be no time for after school programs, help in family, family time, friends time, homework time, relgion/etc classes, and time to have a life. The world would fall apart, and trust me i know. Im a student myself, and im not in place.
October 2nd, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Reading these responces, it just shoes the ignorance of todays youth. You are kids and are not really entilted to an opinion. When you get a job and pay taxes then you might earn the right to spout off about what is what. Furthermore, teachers complaing can shut the hell up. You are required to work 185 days out of the year. You are compensated well for the amount of time you work. grow up and take a look around at todays youth, it is truely a scary future.
October 3rd, 2009 at 8:30 am
I’m afraid this is not what us students of America need. By lengthening the school day, the children’s attention span will be stretched too far to actually be useful, so that the extra hours will be virtually useless. America is already trillions of dollars in debt, so do you realize how much money this would cost? Very impractical. In fact, I think the money issue is the biggest problem with this suggestion.
I think Obama should concentrate on better school programs and better school lunches. That’s right, school lunches. Slowly, the cafeterias have degraded into serving the cheapest and unhealthiest food money can buy. And even this should bot be taken care of before other issues are settled. Obama is handling the problems of America all at once- and I believe priorities should come first. Like… the trillions of dollars America owes. And the people in America dying of cancer and other diseases that currently have no cure. Tell me, what’s more important… 1- a child that perhaps needs more school time, or 2- a child dying? Yeah, I picked number 2.
A problem with my cafeteria program idea is that it may be hard to monitor… and an idea dawned on me. How do we make students more effective? Why don’t we make the school day more like the working day? Here are some benefits:
1. Students won’t have to get up as early, therefore allowing them be be better rested and more active in school.
2. Students won’t have to stay with hired babysitters for an hour after school and wait for their parents to come home; or at least the wait-time will be shorter. Therefore, parents save money on babysitters.
Problems:
1. It may cause dinners to become later.
2. Babysitters won’t get as much pay.
So, a summary to my long comment:
Obama’s plan= not cost effective. Bigger problems like America’s debt and cures for deadly diseases should be taken care of first. And is Obama wants to do something involving school, he should make the school day more like the work day.
And now, I’m afraid I will be slammed by comments… oh dear.
October 3rd, 2009 at 7:49 pm
This is a total outrage! I demand they leave it as it is, who gives a damn about the other countries and their problems, what about our problems! Yes, I am a high school student and I do not like it. The students themselves need breaks. L;onger school days means they wont get as much of a break. Students have problems of their own, homework, class work, test, and major exams. Also, they don’t spend much time with their famlies. Every one is equal as people, not as foreign countries. Why should we be equal to them, they make different dicisions as we do. I’d say we do not extend the school year, it will lead to more problems, many schools had students loaded with guns and ready to kill somebody if they don’t get something their way. We, the people should be equal and just leave the laws as they were so it wouldn’t lead to other problems.
October 3rd, 2009 at 8:50 pm
I am a parent, I am truly against Obama’s plan of extending the school year. It is silly and does not make sense. He needs to drop this idea. My children come home tired after a long day and no child needs to be in school longer, the day is long enough! I miss my children like all parents should. I want to spend time with my little ones. He does not at all need to make school longer. I am angry. Children need their summer vacation. It is time to spend with their parents and their siblings, and visit family members they have not seen in a while! He needs to drop this ridiculous idea and worry about the jobless rate in our country, which has gone up again.
October 4th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Didn’t Obama once say something about “sitting down to dinner as a family” or something like that? With his proposal, will we have time for that? No. What about kids with after school jobs that need to support their family? What about sports?
Enlightened, ((See post somewhere above me)) it’s very easy for you to say that we children need more education, when all you have to do is sit back and watch us work. From your comment, I gather that you are not a student, so who are you to tell us to do more work?
Lets see Obama trying to explain what he wants to do to my class. I’m afraid their opinions, as Enlightened stated, would result to something like “f*** you”.
You call us lazy. What if Obama wanted to make everyone work longer than they do? How would you feel… annoyed? Scandalized? Pshaw, you’re just being lazy.
Adults think we should do more not because they are mean, but just because they don’t have to do it. Its very easy to tell your neighbor to do something, but not as easy to do it yourself. So, would you go through what we kids would go through because of Obama’s plan. Before you say yes, think carefully. No, I believe you wouldn’t. Once you actually stare the challenge in the face, you’ll realize that you have limits.
The real problem is that you believe children are full of endless vigor and energy. We may be energetic, but it is not endless. If anything, we are more limited than adults in the field of endurance, so if you believe you could go through what I stated earlier, remember that a child might not.
My response was rather articulate for an 11 year old, was it not? So to sum it up:
Children have limits to their energy. Adults should not be so eager to tell us to do something while they kick back and relax.
Oh, how I do ramble…
October 4th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
I am against Obama’s ideas because we kids wont have a lot of time for other class activity. My writing teacher would not have me and my friends in her class. My ballet teacher wont get kids in her class because we don’t have enough time. My piano teacher too.
October 4th, 2009 at 7:10 pm
i like how the first person spelled “apposed” wrong. haha. you have no idea.
October 4th, 2009 at 7:28 pm
It’s interesting that I just wrote about this in my blog (my first few entries, actually). My biggest problem is that it will kill all after-school activities. I was in school not long ago and I would never had survived another few hours. It was just soo boring. I was a very good student (valedictorian, in fact), but that didn’t make the classes any more interesting. I was lucky to take a few college courses, so I was in school for less time, but I still felt exhausted after a day was over. Now think about going another two hours, with extracurricular activities. Impossible.
And how about varsity sports? When will they practice? Students would do sports until 9pm and then be faced with homework. That is not the lifestyle that a student should lead and certainly not what I’ll be supporting by paying my taxes (which would increase as a result of this plan, for sure!).
October 5th, 2009 at 8:28 am
No! No! No! Kids have so much on their plates already – for crying out loud! Make the education gap shorter through, parent education, quality teachers and, most importantly, a school curriculum that makes sense. I moved my kids from a failing school to a top performing school (both public). What is the difference between the two? Number 1 – the way parents raise their kids. To sit still and listen. To be respectful of the teachers. No. 2: The curriculum. For math both schools used curricula based on Chicago Math. No. 3 – the teachers who give up on these kids who disrupt the class, who are disrespectful and who don’t care with no way to discipline them adequately.
The result of the combination of these factors: the failing school’s kids floundered and the top performing school did great – why? Because the parents in the top performing school is willing to put in the extra hours to make sure their children understand the work (sometimes as many as 2 hours a day for our family.) But the fault lies with a curriculum which moves kids through concepts at the rate of two or three new things a week. There is absolutely no time for assimilation of everything thrown at them, let alone obtaining a feeling of mastery. Worse, the have butchered math with English – imagine the outcry if that was done to English. Imagine if there were reforms that said “+” had to be written instead of “and” for example. Be smarter about education, not keep kids in their desks longer.
October 5th, 2009 at 10:20 am
School is boring and adding some more days it is going to be a piece of crap and the drop outs percentage will be raised.
October 5th, 2009 at 3:21 pm
You know what’s amusing? Most of the people who wrote that we need more education and the youth of America is too young and useless to get a say misspelled most of the words.
“When you get a job and pay taxes then you might earn the right to spout off about what is what”
((Quote from mike (see above post… somewhere above my first post.)))
“Reading these responces, it just shoes the ignorance of todays youth”
((Another quote from mike.))
Oh no… it looks like our ignorance is shoeing.
By the way Claire, excellent comment. I applaud your thinking.
October 5th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
If we lengthen days, then we have absolutely NO time to do homework or anything else! Teachers complain that they have other things to do as opposed to grading papers, etc. when they arrive home. Well it can’t go both ways for teachers. They overload us with homework, and they can just go home and not do anything because “We have other things to do,” as quoted by one of my Algebra II teachers. This is rediculous. Kids just don’t try. And making them go longer will just make them go even less. It won’t work. Kids will skip even more. He is so stupid!
October 5th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
I feel as though this is a just a huge race between the countries!
October 6th, 2009 at 8:48 am
Dr J, although I agree with the last part of your comment, but when teachers overload us with homework, they just have more work to do. As quoted from one of my teachers “We don’t enjoy giving homework… because then WE have to grade them.”
Well, it is harder to do the homework than to grade it. And if your teachers complain about grading homework… well, that’s sad. Really, really sad.
If Obama was the president of France, this wouldn’t work at all. Students would go an a five year strike until he finally negotiated a NORMAL school day. Unfortunately, I’m afraid the youth of America has less sway than the youth of France. Which means they’d round us up like cattle and shove us back in school.
October 6th, 2009 at 8:53 am
This is a terrible idea, especially for younger students, such as kindergarten age kids. Kindergarteners need more play time and time with their families. Teachers should not be responsible for raising children, they are to be a support system for the educational needs of the children. Family is more important than education at this level. Currently, there is a shortage of highly qualified teachers and this change would only increase this shortage. Teachers are some of the lowest paid professionals in America; therefore, the only perks that they have are the breaks and time with their families. This change would take these non monetary benefits away, leading to “highly qualified teachers” looking for other professions. Get back to the more pressing issues, such as the war and the debt. Also, I am married to a farmer and there are still family farms in America. In addition, you want to help the public school system, put prayer back into the schools.
October 6th, 2009 at 9:44 am
I dropped out because I had an undiagnosed learning disability. It just isn’t natural for children to sit still all day in a crowded, airless room, under glaring, fluorescent lights. What are they going to do about bullying? What of life skills and joyous, meaningful experience? What are they going to do about the strain of BEING there? I’m a 30 year old Democrat and this horrifies me.
October 6th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
Dear Mr. Obama,
I just would like you to know as President, children of america today barely have the attetion spans let alone focus to comply witha 6 hour day and 180 day school year. Adding to our school day and the length would only cause anger and rebellion to arrise within the student body. If it is academics your worried about then simply add more criculum and take away the unecasary things, or instead of adding ciriculum improve it. If you think it serves as an alternative for running around the streets and misbeahving then erect community centers or improve the ones already present. No disrespect to you or your effort. I hope you are a succseful President.
Thank you for your Time.
October 6th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
I am a Middle School Student, and I can barely keep up with homework, projects, and tests already. If the school day and year is lengthened, kids will fail and drop out because most kids zone out after 2 o’ clock. Also, adding more time will do more bad than good, like taking time they can spend with their family and sports children like myself might play. And how will you pay the teachers extra for staying longer if the economy is as bad as it already is? I see no good coming out of this idea, and even my parents agree.
October 6th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
obama is retarded
October 6th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
I understand what obama means. But longer days and years just don’t make any sense at all. High school student said If it is the curriculum that is needed to improve on change it then. Ff is the misbehaving and running around the streets then this will make it worse. As a 7th grader i know that i love to go to after school activities involving of not involving school. EX. Soccer and music. Now if school adds an hour i Won’t get home until 4:00pm this leaves an hour for homework leaving us at 5:00 if dinner isn’t till 6 or later this will give me time to go around on the street. Plus if you they do make school days longer. I would try to protest and i bet some kids would skip the extra time.
October 6th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
I do not believe in extending the school year or days for our children, I do not care what other countries have or don’t have, these kids will eventually have to become responsible adults, and have to answer to life 24/7 and I think being a child happens once, and should be enjoyed. If extending the school year is something that needs to be done in areas where parents don’t get involved or students don’t behave, then so be it, maybe both would think twice to appreciate. But to expect our children to do what other countries do because you are trying to make a name for themselves, your just plain self center, I learned algebra in 8th grade my son is learning it in 4th, I think that speaks for its self. If you look at the statics there is also a higher suicide rate in those other countries then the United States, so I think Obama should focus on figuring out how to make this country not so dependent on other countries, instead of trying to be like them.
October 6th, 2009 at 7:25 pm
First of all extending the school year so there is no summer vacation wouldn’t be good. The high school students usually work during the summer, so they can save up money for college and other things. If there is no summer, there is no time to work. If you also extend the school days, the students wouldn’t have as much time to do their homework, or spend time with their families.
October 6th, 2009 at 9:57 pm
i personally think that the school year should not be extended, for 12 months long, like we need our brake, we’ve spended our time ,long time in school, we get up early to go to school, i think its fair that we have a “summer break”, teens and pre-teens need to hang with their friends, because 87% kids learn from their friends, in a good way, i tihnk my opinon if very strong, like no kid would wanna go to school for 12 months long, its basically not fair to us, like what if our parents want to go on vaction? they wont have the oppurtunity to, because there children have school. everything would change very much, if school was 12 months long.
October 6th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
I am a Korean living in America. I attended kindergarden at a strict Korean school and I remember going to school and coming home everyday at around midday. Everyday there was also a drill where every child went out to the field to have their morning excercises and stretches. It was pretty refreshing and a good practice America should consider adopting.
Oh yes, I think I attended saturday school as well.
I’m in high school right now and seeing the data here, I see how the US is behind other nations. If we’re going to compete, we might as well compete well. I support extending the school year, or at least paying teachers well enought to have fully motivated teachers who engage their students in their work. Education pays off in the end, I hear.
October 7th, 2009 at 11:11 am
Boo-hoo to the teachers. Yes, it is a noble career and as a parent I appreciate you teaching my children. However, when I was in school we attended from 7:45 to 3:30. By the time you took the bus home, parents were usually home right after. Kids today get in too much trouble with all of that extra time. My friend is a probation officer and says that the number of kids on his roll is incredible. At a prestigious school at that.
I am also tired of hearing that teachers do not get paid much money. The $30-40k a year is an average salary these days and most people don’t get the health insurance, retirement and all the other benefits provided. Not to mention all the days off that the schools take now. There is a half day once a week, an in service day at least every two weeks, summers and holidays, vacation and sick time. Come on! And the union backs you up for everything that offends you.
Go Obama Go!
Take the time to teach our children as you are paid to do and not send my child home with 3 hours of homework.
October 7th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
For those who think we should not increase the amount of time our students spend in school or engaging in academic activity needs to watch this video (the entire film is worth watching, but here is a 2 min. soundbite). “2 Million Minutes”- this compares US students to China and Indian students. Scary!!
October 8th, 2009 at 10:35 am
WHEN’S IT GONNA START? IM GONNA GRADUATE THIS YEAR AND I HAVE TWO SISTERS AND A WHOLE LOT OF COUSINS STILL IN SCHOOL. SURE IT’S MORE TIME TO LEARN, BUT THINK ABOUT THE TIME, TOO LATE FOR KIDS TO STAY UP JUST TO FINISH THEIR HOMEWORK. USE UR BRAIN.
October 8th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
I disagree with the extended school days. If we did have extended school days just to make the U.S.A look good then it’ll only hurt us. Kids have as the years progress been droping out I fear that with extended days the percentage will indeed increase. Before any rash decissions be made Obama should think about the results, and not just the fact that some kids may have a higer IQ with this plan.
October 8th, 2009 at 11:08 pm
get good teachers not some stupid ass off the the street who is untalented and just a piece of crap quality is the key and while your at it make the schools nicer i mean really finding packs of smokes outside of US history is a great way to start the day. The main thing that really gets me ticked is im a boy scout and i love helping the community but it is a great thing to go to you school and pick up hundreds and over the years i wouldent doubt thousands of pounds of trash on weekends and when u come back on monday its clean but by the middle of the week the school looks worse than before and it sounds like a rant but it leades me back to my origional point, it doesent take a smart person to put a piece of trash in a trash can and if we had good teachers we could teach people that. NEVER MIND IM ALL FOR THE COME BACK OF THE PADDLE POLICY!!!!!!!!!!!!
October 11th, 2009 at 7:39 pm
So now it isn’t about the nations education, it’s just about how much time we spend IN school? It’s just teaching the exact same stuff with the exact same teachers? You could barely even call it that. It seems like all he wants to do is beat all the other nations. If we are losing the EDUCATION part of the curriculum, they should make higher standards, not just longer times.
October 12th, 2009 at 8:19 am
Um, John, you have some good points but it’s kinda hard to read your writing. Casey, fantastic argument. I completely agree.
So far, we have more statements opposing this idea than supporting it. Obama, going through with this will seriously kill your reputation with the youth of America.
October 12th, 2009 at 11:25 am
I’m pretty sure 90 percent of the posts on here are middle school republican children. We need to compete with other countries or else our nation will never succeed in international enterprizes. So many people are lazy and just idiots. I know people who graduate with a second grade reading level. This is thanks to no child left behind. We have to stop settling for average and strive for the best. We have to want to achieve excellence.
Yes teachers pay and qualitly will have to be changed, but we have to make sacrifices in order to achieve excelence.
October 12th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
I’m a senior in high school. I make A’s and B’s in a public school which is considered to be top in the state. I don’t try….at all. I do less than try. I don’t feel challenged in school. I’m making great grades in mediocre classes. I don’t like the idea of longer school days, however I do think a longer year would be beneficial. Students don’t need 2 months to forget everything they’ve learned the previous year. If students went year round, they could have like 2-3 weeks breaks, one in each season. I think this would be sufficient. Americans need to stop being so god damn lazy. Stop complaining about your lives! Our nation is on a slow downward spiral and we need change. We need more students to strive to be astronauts, engineers, and congressmen. Students need to strive beyond the minimum. Yes, this may cause a problem in teacher quantity, quality, and pay, but changes are necessary!
I am just appalled by the responses of some of you, naïve, ignorant, lazy Americans! Obama is not socialist, communist, or trying to brain wash your children! He is a man with ideas that can change our nation for the better! Stop using your fraise, “Don’t fix something that’s not broken.” Our nation is broken! Our economy sucks! We need new ideas, and we need to better everything we can! Especially education because education is the building blocks for a strong country. We can’t run a country on a bunch of no child left behind babies with a reading level of the third grade.
October 12th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
As a parent, I am completely opposed to this proposal. Obama states that it is for the poor and underprivileged. That with the longer day and longer school year, it would give kids a safe place to be. What about the parents that have taken up the responsibility of parenthood; that have made a sacrifice to live on one income so that there is a parent home to be there when their children need them. Obama doesn’t take into consideration the parents that do plan and provide for their kids. If this does take place, I see a rise in homeschooling and burn out kids.
October 12th, 2009 at 8:03 pm
I agree with longer school hours, but living in a small town there are not many courses to take. The only reason I go to school is for sports.
I do not think America has the best economy, we are steadily falling into a pit of doom. American’s are becoming more ignorant because the government makes us focus on stupid little things, like gay marriage or flag burning, instead of the big problems like why Americans are still in Iraq or the fact many Americans are losing their jobs and cannot support their family.
America needs more education, if us children have such a great memory to remember every word to many songs, then we can remember why the Revolutionary War was started and who started it. But why is it many of us can’t?
It’s not just the teacher, or just because the class is boring, it’s because none of us children have ‘the want to.’ My coach tell us athletes we have to have ‘the want to.’ The want to win, the want to dominate, the want to be the best.
Obama can have ‘the want to’ for many of us, but we are selves have to have ‘the want to’ to make it work.
The youth of America is starting to become brainless. We all need a reality check and Obama knows it.
I agree with longer school hours, but with better teachers and more core courses.
October 12th, 2009 at 8:44 pm
To add, PARENTS that do not give their children boundaries or discipline are the main reason why the children these days are so disobedient, apathetic, and unmanageable.
And the parents that do not give boundaries or discipline are the ones who have no concern for their child or children.
October 12th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
I have worked as a teacher at all levels. I am appalled to see how the “students” are writing here. If you want somebody to take you seriously you MUST adhere to at least some formality in your writing. “Internet Speak” is for friends and casual conversations. At this point all you are doing is “proving” Obama right! Demonstrate that you can write and think rationally and you will have much more power!
I don’t agree with a longer school year. I really liked the idea of a 4 day school week. There are many students who have to help support their families. If they can work 3 day weekends then they don’t have to work on school nights and will get more sleep and be better prepared for class the next day. I also agree that if we had a 4 day school week we would need to increase the school day. By as much as 2 hours (include some tutoring time).
One of the biggest problems I see in local school districts is class size and student to teacher ratios. In some buildings there are classrooms with 35 middle school students. 12 are “regular” kids, 10 are LEP (Limited English) and 13 are Special education students with many needs. This is too much even for the best teachers!!!
Competent teacher become excellent teachers because they “Have the time to”
If class sizes were smaller many issues would be solved.
1) Teachers would not “burnout” from a very difficult stressful situation
2) Students would receive a much more individualized education
3) Grading time would decrease therefore increasing planning time
4) Curriculum could be covered faster and deeper
5) Curriculum could be connected to real world concerns and discussions (debates) could ensue
6) Students would feel more connected to their schools and teachers. People get to know each other and their needs in a smaller setting.
7) Trust and respect are built on relationships and relationships are built by taking the time to know each other.
9) Teachers would be more willing to give up a “weekend day” for staff development if they knew they would still have 2 more days to take care of “home matters”
10) Home work and projects can still be assigned for the “long weekends”
11) Strong teachers will only get stronger.
We must provide teachers appropriate staff development and the means to implement what they have learned.
There are so many things wrong in our educational system that just making it longer only makes the students and teachers stay in a rough situation longer. It will not improve things. A longer day and a shorter week would provide for so many opportunities without losing what we already have.
So here is my rant.l Take it or leave it. It is my 2 cents worth. Happy learning!
October 13th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
obama will surely rank as one of the worst presidents of this country so far he hasnt done shit like he said he was going to change change change he aint doin nothing and this is just making it worse correct the things like the economy and the war in iraq before you go and do something like this and i hope he is aware that all his reputation with americas youth which fucking go him voted in the first place will be gone good luck obama fuck you
October 13th, 2009 at 9:08 pm
I’m a freshman, who goes to Boston Latin School. Going to an exam school, I expanded my education as well as learned more about our nation. Extending school days would have more of a negative effect on our economy as well as other students. Not all children study hard and try to achieve good grades. In fact, most of the students here don’t, despite the fact that it’s one of the top schools in the country. I understand that Obama is trying his best to heighten our testing scores, but it’s not going to work. As a straight A student, I know it won’t. Say a student fails a course, how would they make it up when summer vacation’s been cut in half? It’s hard to heighten the test scores of students in America. First of all, we are a pretty big nation. We’re also very diverse. Being the big nation we are, with many different races and cultures in our society, we are bound to have children that wont do well in school. That’s just how it is. We shouldn’t be looking at the amount of time we spend in school, but at the quality of our work, meaning our test scores compared to other countries.
October 14th, 2009 at 10:54 am
i think that obama is stupid to do this just stupid, the drop out rate will go up tremendously!!!!!! kids dont like school period making the day longer is just going to piss them off.
October 15th, 2009 at 12:00 am
I don’t think it is a good idea that the school day or year should be extended. Because for all students it would give them less time to do homework, staying up late studying for tests or exams, and being less involved in extracurricular activities and family time. Kids, teenagers, and teachers alike would be tired by the day’s end, overworked and exhausted. Children will lose interest and become less motivated to go to school. By the end of the extended school year, children will be completely drained and thereafter they would have to start up again for school. They need a summer break to rest their minds and relax. We need to instill the idea to our children that going to school is enjoyable not unpleasant. Of course there seems to be disadvantages and advantages to this proposal, like higher completion rates, higher test scores, and maybe higher GPAs’. On the hand, maybe more absences or dropouts migh increase and lack of interest may occur. However, I think we should focus on taking care of other higher priorities first, like our national debt crisis and health care problems.
October 15th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
I think this is ridiculous. I’m a public school student, and I think it has nothing to do with the length of the school day, or how many days we have, it’s how we use them. Many of the teachers at my school sit behind their desks all day and text and talk on the phone and just pass out worksheets. If you go to tutoring, they just tell you to sit there and do you homework, then leave. Granted, there are a few good teachers, but how does that help the majority? Also, 18 teachers at my school got layed off, so the average class size is 35-45. That is ridiculous. I’m one of the few students who are in favor of year round school. The long chunk of summer we have makes me forget a lot of information, and more breaks and a shorter summer would help many students remember. I do not agree with this ‘educational plan’ at all, however this is the president YOU voted for, so high school students who can not even VOTE are forced to suffer the consequences.
October 16th, 2009 at 9:57 am
This is more of directed to BillSmiven.
Did you think before you wrote your assumptions?? Do you not realize we don’t live to compete with other countries? Were living for our own lives, for our own lifestyles, not yours, or obamas, or any other persons. More students will drop out, or skip classes, or even commit suicide if they have to go longer. WE NEED SLEEP AS WELL! Don’t just think about yourself man, your getting it all wrong!
October 17th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
oh my goodness. obama is so dumb. why did people vote for him? is it only because hes black? but hes also HALF white too. the school needs better teachers, longer days are gonna do squat for the kids. I’m in high school, and I am gonna be so ticked if he cuts my summer. I spend it with my brothers and sister and her kids. My sister needs my help and I’m glad to give it to her. Shortening my summer, yeah, I’m not gonna be too happy.
October 18th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
When I first read this, I was shocked. I’m a straight-A 7th grader, but I read at a 12th grade level. But now, I feel somewhat neutral. I wouldn’t mind about 45 extra minutes added to the school day, and about 2 weeks taken off from my summer vacation, but I do agree with some other people here: we need quality, not quantity.The cons of a larger school year just outweigh the pros.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:11 am
First of all, everyone needs to learn how to spell, because you complaining about the schools teaching stupid classes isn’t making you look any smarter by misspelling simple words like OBAMA. I’m a high school student and i completely disagree with Obama, but that doesn’t make him a terrible President. If he does make school years longer, I’m sure it’s for a good reason, and if he doesn’t then tha’s great. I’m a Senior now, but i still don”t want my family having to go to school year round. I agree that if we do have longer school years then there will be more drop outs. On that note this discusion is pointless. You really think in the long run it will matter? Shouldn’t parents want what’s best for their children? Even if it is a longer school year?
October 19th, 2009 at 10:12 am
I’m aware that i’ve misspelled words,but i’m sure i make a better point then half of you.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:24 am
Guys, as a kid who when in school moved around a lot to countries that DIDN”T have summer break. It isn’t that bad. Really. We have tons of short one week breaks in between and yea, it deff helps you remember stuff. I agree that quality is also an aspect of it but year round school isn’t that bad. You guys are acting like school is this huge burden rather than a gift
October 20th, 2009 at 10:50 am
I think just the students that have bad grades,or just need help should stay after school.Plus what about the kids that play sports.What are they going to do?I really don’t think this is a good idea!
October 20th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
i think that this is really dumb and i dont think this should help older people but nit us.
October 20th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
sorry i didnt mean it like that
October 24th, 2009 at 10:44 am
i do not agree with president obama …
in class we had to write an essay about do we agree or disagree 100% of our class disagree …
it is just unesscary our teaches also stated that you will be increasing the school hours for 2 more hours and she stated that we will be having school on saturday ..
with this proposal our test grades will decrease and the drop out rates will increase
October 24th, 2009 at 11:17 am
i think the school day should not be longer because of the simple fact that we already so tired during class if we are sleepy during class we will not focus as much!!!!!!!!!!!
October 25th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
I disagree with this new proposal of schools being longer and less summer vacation. Personally, I don’t mind the longer school hours MUCH, but school on WEEKENDS and LONGER school years is RIDICULOUS!! Even though I personally don’t mind longer school hours, alot of other students, teachers, and parents do mind it because they are more stressed out (students and teachers) and don’t get enough time with their kids (parents and teachers). I was an Obama supporter, but when I heard about this new law I’m having second thoughts. Longer school hours, school on the weekends, longer school year, and school on the weekends are all stupid. I bet he just randomly made up such an argument…
We are already stressed out as it is! Tons of homework for most students in a majority of the school districts, less recreational time, and less FUN time for students already exist in our current state of the nation! Adding more hours, lessening summer vacation, and school on weekends will make MOST EVERYONE go CRAZY!!!!
October 28th, 2009 at 7:42 am
Obama sucks. Why would we need more school? So dumb if won’t do anything for us, only cause more stress. I agree with the person who wrote:”more schools means more stress…more stress means more depression…more depression means more suicides”
Because he doesn’t even know what he’s talking about.
I say lets get em outta office for our own good.
October 28th, 2009 at 10:40 am
what about all of the extracurricular activities that would be pushed aside as well-anyone who dares to say that they are not necessary should go to hell. Obviously a classroom environment gives students a formal education, but after school activities also teach them social skills and dedication. students need a way to act their age. forcing kids to stay in an uncomfortable environment will only force them away. i agree with many other posts-it’s quality, not quantity. teachers should learn how to make class fun and create a place where kids want to learn. my teachers were lazier than i was and that reflects onto the kids. a longer day with those lazy teachers will just make kids lazier. fix THAT. not the length of time.
October 28th, 2009 at 11:00 pm
I highly agree with the lengthening of school. I find education as a privilege, not a mandatory thing. So if I’m going, I expect to come out of high school or college very well educated. Some protest that if the school day is lengthened then they won’t have any free time. That’s true, but you have to think of how this would better students in the future. Especially in this economy, we need intellectuals. Not people who are mediocre. Education should definitely be a priority.
October 30th, 2009 at 11:43 am
school sucks, people wont like the change.
October 30th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
I agree with extending the school day/year and especially with teacher merit-based pay. In my opinion, you can’t have one without the other.
If you agree with quality over quantity, then tenure should not be granted on the basis of longevity, but instead on the effectiveness of the teacher.
November 1st, 2009 at 3:26 pm
Oh NO. Fix the education system by getting rid of the flaws, not by making it longer. America is stupid because no one gives a about education, get the over it!
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:23 am
Perhaps Mr. Obama should look at 2 factors when comparing our children to those in other countries. First, he needs to be reminded that we are the only country of those listed that actually educates all of its children. In many of those countries, like South Korea, kids have to compete for spots in high school and the rest have to go to work. They also don’t educate their children with disabilities. We do and most of their test scores count right along with the other kids. The second issue is pressure on students. I’ve had several foreign exchange students who came to my school to escape this pressure to excel in their countries. If you look at the teen suicide rates in many of the countries listed, you might get a better picture of how all of this extra time in school is really affecting these kids.
November 3rd, 2009 at 9:54 am
hey, wats up.. im a middle school student and i DO NOT like the idea of extending the school days,,and i think to me it looks like my little brother wrote the rules,, but even he would not write rules like that…>:(
November 3rd, 2009 at 5:14 pm
I want to learn more so maybe having extra school would be good. And maybe they will add more electives if they lengthen the school days and add periods.
November 4th, 2009 at 1:23 am
He can’t do that. Nancy must have talked him into it. She’s a Know-it-all. Congress will never go for Obama’s Education Plan. Our School System is fine the way it is.
November 6th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Don’t we spend enough time in school? We go to school all day, come home and do MORE homework, and pretty much only have the weekends for free time! We deserve a couple months in the summer off of school!
Obama trying all this junk that isn’t going to help, just make this country worse! Obama’s ruining this country!
America — what was going through your brains when you voted for this idiot liar?!
November 7th, 2009 at 9:22 am
I am a sixth grader, so my voice may not matter much. But I think its a terrible idea to extend the school year! I’m not saying this just because I’m a sixth grader. I am doing perfectly fine in school. And when I get home, all I want to do is take a nap. But I have homework to do. So I can’t. After my homework, I have dinner. Then I practice my instrument. Then I have a shower. Then I go to bed. And I never get any free time. I don’t think its fair, and neither does any kid in this country (probably). I have an imaginative mind. I am actually thinking of volunteering at a local animal rehabilitation center. But it already closes at either 5 or 4pm, so its not enough time in the first place. And who cares about what other countries are doing? Caring about other countries led us into war. With more time off in summer, we get more t ime to explore. When you explore, you learn! You learn about life. And thats what its all about, life. Schools prepare us for life, but we learn about it ourselves, too. But without any time, we can’t explore! Like I said before, I have a big imagination. And not being able to release it when I’m busy with schoolwork is just like locking up ideas in a safe that could someday help the world. This is coming from a childs point of view! I thought Obama was a good president, but now, I’m not so sure…
November 7th, 2009 at 9:40 am
And another thing. If kids summer got cut in half, then we would sit in school all day during summer thinking about what we could be doing right now. I know I would. Then we wouldn’t pay attention. And besides, if we got home later, we would have to eat dinner first, then stay up late doing homework and studying. Then we wouldn’t have any time to shower or practice our instrument or anything like that. This is not a good idea. And what about the teachers? They will be exausted, too! They won’t get any work done, then we won’t get any work done. And, speaking as a kid, listening to teachers drone on all day about the same thing every day is BORING. I fell like i’m going to fall asleep. But I am doing very well in school. I do well in all my subjects. I read at a higher level than I should be. So it would be unfair to me and all of the other kids who do well to extend school time. And another thing. More time in school means less time exercisinig. Then what? Every kid in the country becomes morbidly obese? THINK! USE YOUR BRAIN, OBAMA! YOU HAVE ONE, RIGHT? Or,wait, maybe you don’t…
November 7th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Many kids work extremely hard everyday. They can barely function the with the normal school hours. Imagine extended time. Students won’t get anything done. Teachers also work extremely hard. because of our current economic situation, are they going to get paid extra? Obama must look at all the United States of America is facing now, and try to help these issues. if he doesn’t stop these issues now, how will anything else get done? Lastly, no matter what Obama does to extend the school day, the kids decide if they want to put the effort in their school work. Nothing Obama says can change what they do in school.
November 9th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
-i think we should go to school 3 days a week
and for only 4 hours a day 
on May 1st. [don't ask why]
-we should also have more holidays. there should be
National Teenager Day
-schools should offer more electives to their students.
OBAMA, hear us out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sincerely,
Mullet and Face
November 9th, 2009 at 10:56 pm
I think it’s a great idea for year-round formats, however, to longer the day will just stress students out. Many students already feel that there aren’t enough hours in a day as is. I am intrigued with the responses opposing his argument though. If you read many of them, you see that many have errors within them. Not just one or two, which could be considered a typing error, but grammar and spelling constantly messed up. In which makes me fight harder for Obama’s cause… It clearly shows that with the 8hr days students leaving with the knowledge that they should be. Especially if they are trying to use larger words, you would think if they are going to use them.. A. they would use them in the correct context. or B. at least spell them correctly.
November 10th, 2009 at 9:23 pm
We should have better quality teachers and more pushing MATERIAL. A lot of people in my school are doing awesome and are BORED with the curriculum. We should have a more challenging curriculum. More dumb, busy work won’t help us Obama! A more challenging school year with the same amount of school will help much more. We have enough busy work homework and enough school as it is!
November 13th, 2009 at 9:28 am
the drop-out rate would shoot up w/ in like 1 or 2 months and schools would need lots of more money and kids need to see there parents and after school ppl have 2 practice for sports and by the time they get home they missed supper and no family time left…..srry but who voted 4 him????
November 13th, 2009 at 9:38 am
idc if ur kid goes to school everyday he can and still doesnt get the concept because its rather the teachers faught for not teaching them like they are supposed to be or ur kid dont listen……END OF SUBJECT ……and obamas kid if ur readin this….drive ur dad so carzy about not doin this:) thanks ily
November 13th, 2009 at 9:41 am
this is rediculous!!!!!!!!!! do you want all these kids to drop out?? if you extend the school year or school days kids will get tired and either drop out or not try at all. so it wont be affective. no family time no friend time!! what are you thinking??!! i play two spotrs i wouldnt get home till wayyyyy past dark AND i would still have to do my homework and eat and all that stuff!!! i would be way in over my head. I WOULD FAIL SCHOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
November 13th, 2009 at 9:45 am
As a 7 grader I think that the school year is fine. I mean I go to school then come home and work and do homework. If he3 extended the school day then kids who ride the bus for a hour or kids with after school activites would barely have enoughh hw time and not enough family time.
November 13th, 2009 at 9:46 am
i am alredy wayyyyyyy stressed out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
November 13th, 2009 at 9:56 am
I think it would be a big mistake. Cause more people would drop out of school. We wouldn’t have time to do homework or anything. Kids would be getting home late. Football games and basketball games would start very late at night and end very late at night. We would have a short summer. Parents would have to pay more money for our education at school. Less people would go to school and just stay home and get home schooled. And finally everybody would stop going to school,which means we would have no more shools our and no more teachers. I think obama shouldn’t extend the school year if he knows all of this would happen.
November 13th, 2009 at 11:50 am
Most students who posted with support for the program are intelligent people who do well in school and don’t really have to try. But think about our less gifted fellow prisoners, um, students. (That was a joke, please don’t take it too seriously. Really.) They already work hard to keep up their level of performance… a longer school day, and they’l have a harder time in school. Perhaps we should just have extra programs for the more gifted ones…. if I may humbly include myself in that category.
Now, to be showered with comments on my vanity in the previous statement…
November 13th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
why would you won’t to punish us kids if we have not even nothing !!! I will go home school if not that i will drop out of school!!! when i get old enough !!!!!:) i hate school enough but i love my teachers !!! and the most you dont need to call us stupid compared to them and then why do some of them come to america 4 education !!!!
November 14th, 2009 at 10:12 pm
No to Longer School Days:
1. Wow…what was Obama’s grade point average? He’s not actually that stupid is he? Obama does realize that they kick all the stupid kids out of school in those countries. While… we accepted every student in our country, and that’s okay. Every kid should be given a fair chance, that’s one of the biggest, if not the biggest, reason why our country is so diverse and filled with some “less successful” people.
2. On a another note, though, does he honestly believe increasing school hours or lengthening our school year will help students that don’t care? If a student doesn’t care, they don’t care, and I can tell you with complete confidence that they will just hate school more the longer it is and the longer it lasts. And…the more a kid hates something the less they will try. WHich means the worse tests scores will get and the worse America will look. Also, Obama is only seeing half of the machine, while he trying to fix the whole machine, and you should never fix something that’s not broken. Now… I realize the whole matter of how do we sort out the good from the bad, but there are ways. Though… I’m sure one of the biggest reasons why people don’t try to find those ways is time on their behalf… so instead it’s time on all the students behalves. (This RETARDED plan will make the good students better and the bad students worse!)
(3. Also, there are sports for a reason! I’m at school ’til 5:45 each night for sports when school ends at 3:05. If people want kids to be safer because they don’t have a good home life use the dang money the federal government is giving schools to create a fun activity that uses time of kids in an enjoyable manner, not more work. Gosh sometimes the government seems so… stupid. Some things don’t have to be so hard!)
November 15th, 2009 at 10:13 am
Just one more step towards Obama’s nanny state. Wake up America!
November 15th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
Those looking at this negatively are students who HAVEN’T researched anything beyond this article/speech. Those ‘high-risk’ students who struggle in school, have shown in studies that they do better with education year-round. Those “gifted” students, or those that oppose longer days or more school, reply to this blog, and sound so unintelligent, which is why it IS necessary for longer or more days in school.
November 15th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
Hmmmmm, better teachers, teachers who don’t just give the kids busy work (I wish I had the time to give them this mystical “busy work”), teachers who give too much homework…as a teacher, I wouldn’t mind having “better parents.” Parents who attend conference, don’t enable their children (”Johnny couldn’t return to school after his 8:30 dentist’s appointment!”) or who actually support schools. I spend nearly every waking moment thinking of how to improve your child’s education and skills, do you?
November 17th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
If that happends Im dropping out theres no way Im doing this
November 17th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
BTW Im all As and Bs student and Im already overloaded as it is with school … Even when Im really sick and have a virus I gotta go, from all this learning Im EXHAUSTED when I get home. Its hard already as it is specially with all the useless junk we learn like history etc. I would simply drop out theres no way Im doing more hrs at school…
November 17th, 2009 at 11:18 pm
When I get home I have NO support from my mom..She dont care her boyfriend is always drunk plus I have a 8 month old at home. I have really good grades and I think there will be a big problem maintaining that if we get longer days. We need to encourage students to do good not try to MAKE them. That will only get you a stronger rebelion.
November 17th, 2009 at 11:24 pm
The less school the more efford the students will give towards the education since they wouldn’t b as bored as usual…
November 18th, 2009 at 8:57 am
If Obama wants to do something beneficial for kids’ education, shut down the Cartoon Network. THAT ain’t gonna happen! But don’t add to their day. The schools get them for 20,000 hours or so of their childhood; enough is enough. We parents need time with them too — time to make up for the “spiraling math” curriculum, for the “lies my teacher told me” (see book by the same name) in history class, and for the expansion of their minds in the numerous ways either absent in or contradictory to what is taught in the structure of the classroom. Check out “Dumbing Us Down” if you want to understand what I mean. Independent thinkers do not come out of factory schools.
November 19th, 2009 at 9:54 am
oboma can forget ending smmer break most of my friends said they would drop out if he did he is soo stupid for comeing up with the ideal who cares how long japan goes to school this is america
November 19th, 2009 at 10:17 am
who ever says they agree with obama is sooo sooo stupid only ppls that like school wuld agree with him. what about the teachers they have to put up with bad students and now the are goin to have to put up with it for longer
November 19th, 2009 at 10:20 am
obama should get ready to get voted out of chair hint…. hint…
November 19th, 2009 at 10:22 am
it me agin if u agree that obama should just stop mail me something
November 19th, 2009 at 10:24 am
how the heck did obama get the no bell peace prize he just got a lot of vilence from student
November 19th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
PEOPLE!!! Its lengthening the year!!! not the day!! if we are in school all throughout the year instead of having 60 days out of school, we won’t forget as much. I think its a great idea. Aside from how your school is individually run, with bathrooms and food and everything, it eally shouldn’t matter too much.I mean face it, we don’t learn as much as we should. We go to school the least from all major countries and we are behind in all subjects aswell. We don’t need vacation and fun if its all going to be pointless when we get older. What we do need is more education because that will help us in the long run when we want to go to college and get good jobs.
November 19th, 2009 at 7:38 pm
This is a bit different than I expected… I though we’d end up having a nice debate here, with people commenting on peoples comments and some people who stop by every few hours to watch the thread and see what the others are up to. This seems to be more of a one-shot thing; you come, you post, you leave never to return again. I seem to be one of the only people who regularly post and comment on others… but I’m not complaining. Really.
Oh, and WOW- I assume you are an adult, yes? When you were speaking about the unintelligent gifted, I presume you were speaking about me. I do seem a bit presumptuous with my annoyingly flowery talk and self-praise, but it’s the closest thing I’ve gotten to a response. Surprisingly, my above comment did not get any hatred… perhaps I wasn’t agonizing enough?
November 19th, 2009 at 8:33 pm
talking to linda why would you want to shut down cartoon network no one in middle school and up would even watch it it is for young kids realy
November 20th, 2009 at 12:15 pm
To a student (see post above)- Bravo! Now that’s what I mean…. responding to someone else’s post directly! Actually, I have heard of 20 year olds that still watch cartoons and such… but I sympathize with them. We’re in too much of a hurry to grow up these days. However, I applaud your thinking, mademoiselle… monsieur…. um?
If my annoying french vocabulary doesn’t stir annoyance, nothing will!
November 20th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
hey aaron… your the reason why we need to go to school longer… and to all those people that say they would drop out of school… stop acting so high and mighty. We all know you answer to your parents, and hopefully they do whats best for you and would make you stay in school. And we are not losing all of our summer vacation, it would probably just be divided into thirty days in school and thirty days out.
November 22nd, 2009 at 1:09 pm
Lauren- why do you support Obama’s idea? Can you give specific reasons, for example; do you feel that you need more school time because you have a hard time learning?
November 23rd, 2009 at 3:50 am
The children writing complaints on this commenting area are ignorant and uneducated. That is the point that Obama is trying to make. A longer school year is much needed because I am ashamed to live in a country with middle and high school students who cannot spell, who are not humble, who are not intelligent, who are not honest, who are not hard working, and who are just so lazy. Just a few years ago, I was in high school too. I played two varsity sports, was in band and in a numerous amount of clubs. I woke up early too, had classes all day too, stayed at practices until six too, and still made time to do homework. All adults have been through school and have been through the same thing that you are going through. Honestly, unless you are eighteen, you really do not have a say anyways. You are not old enough to vote for a reason. You do not have the intelligence to think for yourself, and know what is best for you. A longer year would make all of you all smarter. Education is a gift, not a waste of time to be thrown in the garbage. Students: why don’t you take the time you are taking to read the posts and write responses to spend on your homework or time with your family.
November 23rd, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Hmm…. not intelligent, not hard working, not humble and lazy… that might have been directed at me. Well, at least I can spell, which saves me from the me from the clutches of your Average American Student stereotype! Hurrah!
It isn’t just school that makes us smarter, you know. We can learn about other things that matter without sitting in a desk for hours.
Mark Twain once said; “I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.”
November 24th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
For the past six months, President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan have been touting their intention to lengthen the school year in the United States in order to “meet the challenges of a new century.” The only problem with their new plan is that it will not work. Extending the school year (or the school day) is not the solution to the current educational crisis in the United States. The problems plaguing American education are rooted in its very structure and the solutions require a cultural shift in the way we think about education.
Our system of education was founded on the very same ideas as American industry, by the very same man: Henry Ford. Ford’s vision for students was no different than it was for his Model T; input a blank frame at one end, move it along an assembly line while unskilled laborers permanently affix various items, and at the end of the process out pops a completed product. The goal of Ford’s public school endeavor was to create a socially functional individual who could fulfill the challenges of a new century, the 20th century, at a time when what was needed were workers in factories rather than the farmers of the 19th century.
The only problem with this scenario is precisely that Ford was concerned with creating workers for the American factory rather than thinkers or problem solvers. Flash forward one hundred years and what we are left with today are the residual issues plaguing a nation whose educational system was meant to turn out doers instead thinkers; we are trying to prepare minds for the 21st century using 20th century pedagogy.
In order to bring students back to a competitive level with the rest of the world, our entire theory of education must shift. The problem, however, lies in the fact that these changes are distasteful to most who derive their living from education, nor do they lend themselves to pretty standardized tests or readily quantifiable spreadsheets on which public officials can rely for allocating funds. Yet if we truly want to prepare our students for the “challenges of a new century” we must first bring our educational system into the new century. Here is how we do it:
Step 1 -Eliminate Teaching Unions
Teaching unions are the single largest roadblock to educational reform in the United States today. Unions came into existence to protect unskilled laborers from unfair demands by industrial employers. A classroom, however, is not an assembly line. Simply trying to bolt on new information to a child and then testing them to see if they retained it is useless. The job of a teacher is to teach and that means taking the time to make sure each and every student understands the material by teaching it in a way they will understand, no matter how many iterations, no matter how many different ways it needs to be broken down, or how many hours before or after school or during lunch it takes to accomplish this. Unions shield those disinclined to go the extra mile to educate our children. They permit the existence of teachers who are unwilling to learn or change their methodology or pedagogy, despite the radical leaps forward that have been made in our understanding of how children learn in the past twenty years. Unions permit and encourage a “put in your 20” mind-set that robs children of the opportunity to learn. This mentality, and these people, must be eliminated from the teaching pool.
Step 2 – Institute Performance Based Evaluations for Teachers
Teaching is a white-collar profession and teachers should be evaluated based on their performance, just like any other white-collar profession. What Fortune 500 Company guarantees its employees salary increases year after year without considering the quality of their output? Teachers, and teaching unions, contend that Performance Based Evaluations will degrade teaching performance because teachers will constantly be under threat of losing their jobs. Yet this is precisely how corporate America operates and has for half a century. Comparative analysis would seem to indicate that rather than degrading performance, accountability for performance and output actually improves it. The introduction of Performance Based Evaluations will actually bring our educational system into the 21st century and allow teachers to operate and be valued as the white-collar professionals they are, rather than the blue-collar laborers they were originally envisioned as.
Step 3 – The Federal Government Needs to Step Up to the Plate
The Federal Government needs to step in and pick up the tab on substantially more school than the paltry 9% it contributes annually to education . The remainder is fairly equally divided between the state and the municipality. The problem comes when the state or city need some extra money and decide to cut education funding in favor of something else. Students are the real silent-majority in our society, totally dependent on the people in power, yet wholly unable to effect change. Classroom overcrowding and textbooks that are 20 years out of date are not urban legend; they are the facts of public school in America. Why should we have to send our children to private school to learn to use computers and technology that most of us take for granted every day? By providing more funding, the Federal Government can implement serious change in the way schools are funded and supported.
Step 4 – Get Government Out of Schools
The level of oversight imposed on classroom teachers by the state borders on ridiculous. Syllabi prescribed by the states provide very little opportunity for teachers to exercise their training or talents. Furthermore, they provide unreal expectations about how students understand information. There are 21 different learning styles through which we learn yet state mandated educational syllabi rarely permit the time for information to be conveyed in multiple formats. Teachers must be allowed the flexibility to engage students in the learning process, taking as much time as necessary to make sure the information is both absorbed and solidly grounded. The only way to do this correctly is to let teachers do what they are trained to do, develop syllabi and curriculum, and teach them.
Step 5 – Focus on Skills rather than Content
Education in this country is fixated on the accumulation of facts because it is easy to test. The problem with this is that facts, by themselves, are meaningless. Very few of us in our every day lives need to access, let alone have actually retained, the plethora of information we were exposed to, or forced to memorize, in grade school. Instead, what we utilize every day is our ability to compare, analyze, and make rational, forward looking, decisions based on prior experience or knowledge of past events. Yet these are skill-sets that our students not only are lacking, but are never taught. By focusing on skills and teaching students how to think rather than what to think, we will prepare them for the future, regardless of what that future holds.
November 24th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
i absolutely agree with obamas plan………….i mean i want to get more education and if theres an oportunity why not?……..students who dont agree thats because they dont realize they will need it in the future if your thinking of going to college you wanna be prepare dont you?………i think its a good idea and more hours to school is NEEDED……..
November 24th, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Eamon, your argument was brilliant. It isn’t just about about making some tweaks to current schooling, it’s about changing it altogether.
November 24th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
II DO NOT LIKE EXTRA SCHOOL AS I AM A 7TH GRADER. I DONT LIKE THIS CRAZY IDEA OF MORE SCHOOL TO MAKE OUR CONTRY LOOK BETTER. WHY DO YOU THINK THESE JAPANESE/CHINA/ISRAEL ARE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WORLD. THERE IS A REASON!
November 24th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
i agree as i am a former student,…
November 25th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
MWHAHAHAHA I FEEL SORRY FOR YOU KIDSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS
November 27th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
hey anonymous student… i can think of plenty of reasons to legthen the year… as a matter of fact i wrote an entire essay on it, which is how i came across this website. and no, i am not having trouble in school, i am amoung the top 20 student in my grade… its just there are plenty of people struggling in school, and we are behind in acedemics compared to other counrties, and we are the laziest…. so in order to make our country better we need to learn more. And, i agree completely with college student.
November 28th, 2009 at 12:10 am
I understand the extension of school days.. but doesn’t he knows that more school days just kills us?
November 30th, 2009 at 1:06 am
[...] tough challenges from other countries. Now, President Barack Obama, as part of his efforts to improve education in America, is striving to make these fields more appealing to [...]
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:53 am
Dear president Obama: I agree with you on many issues for example I wholeheartedly support your health care reform. I am a teacher with 16 years of experience now aspiring to become school leader/administrator.
A) Extending school year and extending school day should be treated as separate issues.
B) The statistic included in the article is incomplete and therefore misleading. The longer school years in all the mentioned countries do not necessarily correspond with longer school days. Upon further examination you will discover that most countries whose students perform far better than the US students on international math and science tests have in fact shorter school days and many have far fewer teacher-student contact hours as compared to the US teachers.
For example Finland who leads the world in math and science tests: See the results in PISA 2006: http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/15/13/39725224.pdf Page 54 where you will find US students in 36th place out of 57 countries -scoring well below the international average in math. Yet when you look at another statistic http://www.teacherly.com/bruno/posts/6-Teaching-Hours-International-Comparison (this statistic represents an accurate transcript of the data contained in the table from PISA) you will discover that Finish teachers teach (student-teacher contact) about 550 hours and Japanese teachers (with the longest school year) teach 429 hours! Compare this with the average US teacher teaching 1,080 hours that is 50% more Mr. President. And yet Finland, China and Japan are on the top and we are hovering around the middle in math and science tests. It appears that in fact the quantity of teaching has no relevance or even opposite effect on results in regard to students performance. – On the other you will discover that ALL of these countries have NATIONAL curricula, which I believe, among many other factors has a major impact on the QUALITY of teaching. We are making some progress in this regard. I believe it is time to amend our constitution to include our national commitment and accountability for what represents our National Interest in the world of Global Economy and that is well educated population who is consequently able to compete in the global marketplace.
Sincerely, Radomir Quis
December 2nd, 2009 at 11:12 am
I can’t believe that my president, whom I voted for, really believes that what our students need is more time in the classroom. Did he not get enough education when he went through school? I am a high school science teacher and a part time college professor, I believe I am well educated and that I made it through college and graduate school because I had the desire and the discipline to do so. “No child left behind” is a joke! Not every student in our public schools will become college graduates nor do they all have a desire to do so. I had a student once in my chemistry class who, before he could legally drive, could rebuild a car or truck engine in his garage. He had a bright future in doing what he loved, but because of “NCLB” he was forced to take chemistry at our school. He failed the class and retook it the next year and barely passed. He was probably not prepared to take chemistry at the college level. But at age 15, I bet he would have thrived in an automotive engineering class. When I was in high school, I took a very basic Biology course and a basic physical science course. I did not have to pass a test in science to graduate from high school yet here I sit with a Master’s degree in Biology. Maybe we are stressing exit tests too much! teachers are teaching to try and get their students enough information to pass those tests and its all about cramming a lot down their throats without being sure they understand or even have a basic knowledge of the material. We just want them to know it all so that we or the school doesn’t look bad if the students fail. If we could make learning fun again without the stress, then the students will succeed.
As for how we can improve our education system. I believe if we make parents accountable for their students behavior in school, then the discipline at home will increase and it will continue at school. There are a lot of students in this country that think they are untouchable and they no longer care about the consequences of their actions. I know when I was in high I was more afraid of the punishment I would receive at home if I misbehaved at school than what ever the school would do to me. If a student is a discipline issue at school, then the parents should have to attend parenting classes, or attend detention with their student, or pay a fine. This society is bringing up too many adults who believe they world owes them everything and they do not have to do anything for it.
By the way, I also believe ADD and ADHD is a crock, we didn’t have problems with it when we (40 somethings) were in school. Now we medicate our children instead of disciplining them. I think a good whooping is far less abusive than getting out children depending on drugs just to function in society.
December 2nd, 2009 at 4:56 pm
im not gonna right a paragraph, just gonna say its the quality of the teachers, not the length of the day, that prevents satisfactory grades in schools.
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:13 am
um i dont really like it but if it is gonna be good 4 us u never know well its gonna suck because i need time to gather my thought to have a clear head 4 the next school year
December 3rd, 2009 at 7:29 pm
I’m a 13 year old & this is what i feel. I think the idea of extra school time is RIDICULOUSLY STUPID, so in my class we are supposed to write about something that we do not like about the school. So when she mentioned this, I jumped right on it, so I’m going to tell you my idea of this STUPID plan. Longer school time would equal more dropouts, (mainly because we can’t stand school already.) We don’t care to be more competitive with other countries okay? If all of the annoying kids were put out of the classroom & delt with better than they are now then we would have plenty of time to learn. Also no person in their right mind would go to school on a Saturday no matter what you say. School puts WAY too much stress on us already just having 5 days & 7 different classes to go to a day. If you want to do something about education that would help us, let us have Fridays off or NO homework. Homework is GAY it doesn’t do anything but waste our time. We give 8 hours of our day 5 days a week, & when we get home we don’t care to do homework. Also we have a life & friends to hang with on the weekends & your taking that away if you go through with this CRAP, even teachers at my school don’t care for it. When I write my paper I’m going to include all of these details & I will be sure to have proof everything I have said is supported by facts. Also parents REALLY DON’T care for it either, they think it’s VERY DUMB, & we 13 & 14 year olds can read VERY well. Oh and by the way, South Korea & Japan & all those other countries have always been smarter than us, so this will NEVER work, & who cares what they do that’s their business NOT ours. Lastly if you did go through with this STUPDITY your going to make the economy EVEN MORE MESSED UP than it already is; simply because you will be paying more money to the teachers, more money for transportation( & here in Alexander City, AL we spend over a million dollars a year on transportation that could go to school field trips) Re-think this idea, because nobody wants it so why do it? You need to be worried about fixing this MESSED up economy instead of worrying about this STUPID CRAP.
December 3rd, 2009 at 7:52 pm
Well i have to say is that this make no type of sense cause if us kidz stay in school for long there going to end up shotting each other for the look so i find it stupid =} =) !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
December 4th, 2009 at 11:04 am
dont extend school year your going to run r kids mind crazzy:(:(:(:(:(
December 4th, 2009 at 11:07 am
why would you do that thats really fuccccccn dumb blood like on da real
December 4th, 2009 at 11:17 am
ya your right most the kids is going to drop out anny way becuz yr runing thr minds out of control!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! wht is wrtong with yu your a loonaticc
December 4th, 2009 at 11:42 am
i think obama is dum wie hure kiep et the saym cuz the food suks and the tichers dont care about os they care ebaut the mony
December 4th, 2009 at 3:35 pm
I agree with the fact of making the school YEAR longer but I do not agree with the fact that the school DAYS should be longer. Speaking from experience, I have alot of extracurricular activities after school and hardly have enough time to finish my homework making my usual bed time about 9:30-10:30 as well as waking up at 5am to finish whatever homework I had left before heading off to school. I do support this idea but being that alot of kids are already quite busy as it is maybe stretch the amount of days we have school and not the time we have school in a day. Also, by reading some of these comments, I can tell some of us need to work on our english/grammar….
December 6th, 2009 at 12:08 am
Okay, so I have read a lot of these comments, some say the school year can be longer, but not the school days; none of them agree a hundred percent of what Obama wants to do. If he wants to actually do this, he’s going to need to get our country the money first, which I don’t think is possible to do within his term. I am a high school student and believe something does need to be done with our education, but it’s not quantity; we don’t need to take away even more family time, or socializing time to stare at a teacher trying to lecture you, that will cause more dropouts, more people doing drugs to make their lives “better”
We need the schools to have a better experience, make the kids want to learn, and get as much information into them in the time we already have. We don’t need a 24/7 zombie America, we need to relax and use the time that we have, more useful.
December 6th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
I think this plan is ridiculous for a few reasons. I am a student, and I come home every night completely tired, then I have to deal with at least a few hours of homework. If he put on three more hours on school, the kids in the grades below me will be getting home at 7:30. THAT IS RIDICULOUS. The 3rd graders go to bed around 8:30-9:30, so that gives them what, an hour? 2 hours at the most? And then add in homework! When he says, “I know how unpopular this idea is,” he really doesn’t. It would wreck his whole career if he went through with this. 2012 election, he would be a joke! And we all know he’s going to run for a second term. Now, I am an avid Obama supporter, but I could not think of any positives about this.
The only thing it will make happen is angry students and parent, more skipping class, more dropping out, etc. Also, the last two months of school are a joke as it is. Extending the school year will just add on another month of no homework and chilling. You also can’t demand this of the TEACHERS- these poor teachers- are expected to teach for 9 or 10 hours a day? They have a life too! And most of them live at least 20 minutes away from where they teach. Also, think about the sports, singing lessons, piano lessons, clubs etc. we do after school. No one will be able to go to these lessons or clubs after school because it will be too late and we’ll be too exhausted and stressed. Great, so we’re going to school for 10 hours, then coming home to 2 hours of homework? Aren’t there child labour laws? So, we don’t have a 300 day year like the Chinese, big deal. Their society is much stricter; it’s a communist country. We are NOT china, nor should we be trying to copy them. We do business with them. If Obama thinks that this will happen, have a few complaints and be accepted he is sorely wrong. I hope he doesn’t decide to go through with this, not only because I do not want a 300 day school year and a 10 hour day, but because I actually like him as a President and I don’t want to see his career go down the toilet.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
Really? you really think this will work?? “not wildly popular” is the biggest understatement of the CENTURY. kids hate school as it is spending more time in schol would change the country for the WORSE. education is NOT a business asociation! kids need to learn in a good, developemental way. lenghthening school days would just make kids hate school even more than they do and lead to them dropping out. there is no point to this; the americn educastion system is not toy to be changed, no matter how “21st century” we want to become. through school, we are not teachig kids to become good players in the economical international market, instead we are teaching them life skills, and one of those is to fight for your rights. such a blatant attack on the say of the american populace under the age of 17 is wrong. if you want to even consider this, take it to the american school kids. i mean all of them. majority should rule. if they vote against it, it should show how pointless this is and no matter how many aged adults comment on this site it wll not change the kids opinions. if they vote against it, it would show they are capabble of dropping out and cutting to protest, and im fairly sure many parents would support them.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
as a student, i know my fellow students and i would drop out rather than face this turmoil. we are already experiencing burnout from the school we go to in the first place, as long as we are doing well in school, which we for the most part are, it would be smarter to shorten the school year rather than lengthen it. Get real, please, and focus on the depression and the War in Iraq of all things.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
for all those teachers and “top 20″ students or whatever posting they want this on this site, GET REAL. and dont reprimand spelling or language or “text talk”, seriously. we dont seem to have as much time on our hands as you, do we??? think about those other kids in your school, or town. how would they react?! i know that even if you go to a top notch and great national school, a good portion of kids would still drop out. if that would hapen, its not worth it. its not only about you. dont try to represent everyone else you know if you have no idea what theyre really thinking.
December 7th, 2009 at 8:19 am
Hey! I am a student ofthis great nation. My classmates think i have gone loco on them. I haven’t….yet. I believe this is a time were we have to chose between our studies and our personal life, as for me i choose my studies. I didn’t know about the rest of y’all.
At times we have think of what is the best thing for all of us as nation, instead of thinking of ourselves.
December 8th, 2009 at 6:15 pm
I honestly dare the government to pass a bill that will extend the school year, and day. I guarantee my entire school will stop attending after a day. I myself will leave the day of the change.
December 9th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
i am strongly against this because we get enough stress already so having longer days will not help
December 9th, 2009 at 9:47 pm
I’m a freshman and get straight A’s. I take Pre-Ap Algebra 2/Trig, Pre-Ap Biology, Pre-Ap Gifted English, Pre-Ap World History, and Advanced Spanish II. I have first period for one hour every day and then I have three periods for an hour and a half. The next day I have the three periods I didn’t go to the day before. School starts at 7:21. School ends at 1:50. My lunch is only 26 minutes on the dot. I play school sports. When I get home I do my homework then go to bed when I finish. I go to bed at 11 and get up at about 4:50. POINT BLANK I’M NOT GOING TO SCHOOL ANY LONGER!!!!!!!!!!! My entire life is school. I can’t take any more.
December 9th, 2009 at 10:13 pm
I don’t think that’s fair. Making the days longer and vacations shorter, is a bad idea. Obama is focusing on the wrong thing. I just read a post about a person’s parents that had less days of school, and how they were successful. It’s not more education that we need. What America needs is time. My mom says this too me when I get anxious about wanting to graduate and going to college: ‘take your time, you will get there, you just need patience, everything in this life is about time.’ I copletely agree with her not only because she’s my mom, but because she’s correct. Everything will get better with time. Keep the hours of school the same and the vacation days the same. Just make new teachers that are coming in, stronger, have them teach things differently, not the same old boring thngs. Cuz if its one thing that every student will tell you is how boring each class is. Not because of the subject (every student has a favorite/nonfavorite suject) but by the way the teacher teaches the class. Every day the teaching style is the same. We cant even put our desks in a circle so we can see each others faces, we sit in rows, and I go to a public school. The teachers have to be more sypathetic with the students. Thank you for reading even though it was long.
December 10th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
Exhausting to me, laughable to Obama.
My school day is the standard in our country, one that apparently is “mediocre” compared to countries with greater average academic successes.
I do not think the “short” LENGTH of the school day is the reason for the differences in academic achievement. If anything, lengthening the school day would only farther DETERIORATE the standards of achievement. For in many of those “erudite” countries, school days are shorter than ours, yet there are more of them in a year. THAT is the difference. Adding on HOURS to the school day without lengthening the academic year won’t solve anything. On the contrary, it will only decrease the quality of students’ academic performances due to critical lack of sleep. They will have less time at home to finish their assigned work, and less time to learn; don’t like the sound of all-nighters? I don’t either. I don’t think all-nighters or even study-into-the-night are at all beneficial.
Think of the students like me taking taxing AP courses and possibly additional college prep work. Doesn’t Obama want students to excel beyond the standards? How can they do that if they don’t have the time they need outside of school for independent learning and REST for Heaven’s sake? It is a medical fact that a brain that has been drained of sleep is subject to a defective attention span and poor mental coordination. Sleep deprivation is the NEMESIS of excellence, Mr. President! I think even the teachers would agree on that, for a longer school day would not only hurt academic performance, but it would become a major hindrance to educators, whose quality is already quite questionable in many public districts. When the proposal suggests an extension of the school year into the summer rather than a longer school DAY, then we’ll talk.
And yet…that brings a new argument to the stage.
Bottom line: Education is amazing when it comes in the right amounts.
December 10th, 2009 at 8:46 pm
[...] above taken from this article on Edu In Review. The post is a response to the [...]
December 14th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
i believe that if the congress goes through with Obama’s plan then the children of the united states will grow to be boring and their creativity will be lost. i also believe that Obama needs to quit being so competitive. i dont think it matters what other countries do or think, when it comes to our country all that matters is what the people of the united states think.
December 14th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Im a student myself and I do not agree with this extended school day plan, Being the fact that the 8 hour school day wears out us kids enough as it is. School is something which everyone needs but we can only learn so much until we begin to lose interest. Also children need time for families; longer school days will make it to were kids don’t have much time for families. Also it doesn’t help that today families don’t have much time now due to the fact of job hours. Although the fact is that longer school years may be what American students need. Having a longer school year would make it so that we can still learn as much as other countries but still not wearing us out. so if it was just the extended school YEAR i would be all for it.
December 14th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
I haven’t been checking on this article lately… there’s way too many posts to read, and I, as previously mentioned, am very lazy.
To Lauren- It appears my cheap jab at your intelligence was foiled. I really must get more sleep before I start posting comments here. h, and by who’s standards are you one of the most intelligent? (Oh, there I go again!)
December 14th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
Obama’s “pedagogy” is totally wrong. Children need their time to be children! Longer school days does not mean improving the quality of teaching and learning. We should be done is stop excessive testing and let teachers teach. Stop analyzing numbers; knowledge, performance, and students’ cognitive skills cannot be treated as factory objects. Stop blaming teachers and try to improve family and social values!
December 16th, 2009 at 7:55 am
i think u shouldn’t do this because this is going to make the kids crazyer they are going to gert more rebelion on the techers. Plus when summer vaction time come thier brains are going to be on vaction mode so the kids are not going to lern….
December 16th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Please, readers, hear this. I am a boy of fourteen who is fully aware of the problems with this bill. However, I have seen some of the hateful and overall redundant remarks posted here, and I find it disturbing. Obama-Haters, was it not you who, during the dark reign of Bush, admitted to not like his policies, but stated simply that he “is our president, and we must support his decisions”? As a student in the ninth grade, I may not be the most intelligent person here, and I realize that my life experience has yet to flourish, but I am the only one who looks at this from my perspective. I say, it is the duty of every American citizen to question his government, and make his voice heard. I take no side, as I am a neutralist by creed, but the well-known philosopher Kong Fuzi, better known as Confucius, promoted role models called “Junzi,” who respected the socially acceptable, showed deference and tolerance for their fellow people, and did NOT allow their status to stand in the way of progress. Perhaps that age is dead, and there are no more Junzi. But Confucianism makes a valid point: Students need to take an honest look at the problems with education, and strive for success. I know I do. The same applies to weaponmakers: do you see no problem with creating objects designed to kill people with the pull of a trigger? If so, I urge you to find a more admirable profession. If not, God help you.
And just to prove to you doubters that this progressive thought is not restricted to the Chinese, the Persian philosopher Zarathustra, founder of Zoroastrianism(which, by the way provided the majority of the ideals and moral standards of all three major religions: Islam, Judaism, and Christianity), promoted a class of role models like Junzi who would do everything possible to advance humanity’s goals. Maybe Obama, a father himself, who is sacrificing time with his two daughters (who he rarely sees because of the state of our nation), is trying to be Junzi. He could be trying to improve the international standing of this country regardless of its impact on his life. His family suffers when we suffer, perhaps? He values the future of this nation over his own family, maybe? Readers, he is trying to advance this nation, and yet there are those who combat him at every step. But then again, it is our civic duty. Again, I take no side. I live by a credo of perpetual impartiality. And so I leave the choice to you, people.
There is only one right choice.
And you have to find it.
Good luck, America.
December 16th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
I understand where Obama is coming from and I agree that we need more or a better education but I do not agree with the way his is going about it. Extending school hours will only reduce the amount of time we have for after school activities, such as Sports, clubs, and instruments that some students practice everyday. Just extending school hours will not improve our education we need to restructures our quality time in the class. For example I have an Algebra 2 teacher who spends 20min of class time going through everybody and checking to see if they did their homework. Homework grading should not be done in class and should not be wasting class time. That is why you are a teacher it means you grade homework at home or after class time. This leads me to my proposal and I think that to change education and improve our international test scores we need to start we the little ones who are just starting school. Instead of taking nap times in third grade like I did when I came to US they should be studying. The whole educational system needs be restructures and the benchmark needs to be raised to higher standards. Studying Biology in 10th grade is simply too late. It should be started in middle school if not 5th grade. Algebra is not a hard math class and I am sure that if students were just a little more motivated and wanted to learn they could take it in 6th grade. With that said I would like to close this letter by saying that we American students are simply too lazy and not motivated enough to take education seriously. We just don’t want to learn and we hate being in school and we don’t care if other our international peers are smarter then us.
December 16th, 2009 at 3:52 pm
I think as a student, this is a lame idea. As if we didn’t have enough time on our own. U.S. students’ only get after school and the weekends (if we get lucky) to stay home a visit with our family and friends. Me personaly, I don’t like working under pressure and because of it is working under pressure due to the teachers unalbity to control the class. With us working under pressure and along with a long day at school we won’t have enough time out of school to have a small part time job or whatever. Take this advice and take into thought.
December 17th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
this is a stupid preposal. Look what we have now? we have smart citizens coming up with new inventions and ways to make this country a better place.
hear me out. IF ITS NOT BROKE DONT FIX IT thats all u need to hear. Sure i may be a student myself but thats not y im upset im upset because Obama thinks he should fix something that isnt broken but all hes gonna do in the process is break wut he sought after to fix. its just dumb… leave it be thats all i have to say
December 17th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
this comment is to Thora… yea he doesnt need to get competitve with other nations sure i agree with u on that but it does matter what other countries think. Okay lets say…. Germany doesnt like us…. Germany will do something about it… right? so if we dont care what other people think we are going to get in wars and we cant afford them at this point in time.
December 19th, 2009 at 9:30 am
Most of the people commenting this blog are rediculous. How is it that you would comment something without orienting yourself. All you have read is 4 paragraphs briefly explaining obama’s plan. Obama’ s plan of extending the school day or school year is a very caring gesture as a president. Currently our children are only being taught things that are needed to pass a standardized test : math, science, and english. What happened to earth science, social studies and history? It has all gone down the drain. Teachers are obligated to follow specific frameworks every year, and none of them are able to cover them all, why? Because there is not enough time in a school day. Many children who do not understand the lessons are left behind becuase the teacher does not have time to go back and go over what was taught. Schools have lost the rights to teach children what they want to learn, the superintendants are to worried about achieving the test scores the states asks their cities to pass in order to receive more funds. Extended day programs would not only make it easier for the teacher to use different learning methods to reach all of the students, but it would also give students more choices on subjects they would like to learn more about. Many schools which have already implemented the extended day have been able to have children have classes like music, art and p.e which have all been forgotten about ( a perfect example is how obese our children are due to the lack of their daily exercise). Children will also have the ability to chose extracurricular activities like sports, dancing and gymnastics, which many parents of low income are unable to pay for. The extended day is also very convienient for parents who work 9-5 jobs (which most people do). Parents will not have to worry about leaving their children with babysitters or having them go to afterschool programs they have to pay for. For once children will have time to do their homework at school and ask for teachers help. You should look up information before you start talking bad about Obama and the governments efforts to make our schools better and help our students suceed. Instead of complaining you should all do something about it and learn to appreciate any effort made for the well being of our future and the future of our children.
December 22nd, 2009 at 8:42 am
[...] The latest, perhaps most dangerous, and most unnoticed of Obama’s ploys: he wants to extend the school year and even the school day (into the nights), thus requiring kids to spend more time in school. The contra-positive, of course, is that they would be spending less time at home; thus families will be raising their children less, and the government more. http://www.eduinreview.com/blog/2009/03/obama-proposes-longer-school-days-extended-school-year/ [...]
December 26th, 2009 at 5:51 am
As if we didn’t have enough time on our own. U.S. students’ only get after school and the weekends (if we get lucky) to stay home a visit with our family and friends. Me personaly, I don’t like working under pressure and because of it is working under pressure due to the teachers unalbity to control the class. With us working under pressure and along with a long day at school we won’t have enough time out of school to have a small part time job or whatever. Take this advice and take into though..
December 30th, 2009 at 2:22 am
There are some thin if the legitimate work as a line there. Most are sites and marketing study for the site owner rich, not you. The only thing is true legitimacy Ebay, selling things you already own………..
onlineuniversalwork
December 31st, 2009 at 12:34 pm
In case Obama hasn’t noticed, we are BILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN DEBT. Does he realize how much this is going to cost? And to recycle one of my old points; most of the people posting for this don’t have to go to school. That’s right, Priscilla… I’m looking at you. My best guess is that you are already an adult and have no children, otherwise you would understand our logic about this and actually have some human desire to spend more time with your children.
Why do I get no flaming? Don’t get me wrong, the last thing I want to do is end up of Encyclopedia Dramatica…. or even worse, end up on Encyclopedia Dramatica with them approving of me. *shudder*
January 1st, 2010 at 12:39 am
Obama Cutting Summer Vacation and Adding 3 Hours of Schoolday the reason we have short school days and shorter school years is were not fricking china there school days r longer cause they clean there schools after class we pay people as there job to do that you no jobs the things u said you would save yah didnt happen we are not china or japan or iraland were the U.S. and we should have our own standerd not follow thers
January 2nd, 2010 at 7:07 pm
WE DONT NEED MORE SCHOOL DAYS
we need better teachers who know how to teach but not just sit there and let us copy notes all the time…. ughhhhh
January 4th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
I don’t even see how this proposal would even go through congress. Requiring all students to go to school on Saturdays is unconstitutional because it would violate the free-exercise clause and establishment clause of the Constitution because Saturday is the day of rest for Seventh-Day Adventist and Jewish students. I am a Seventh-Day Adventist. We don’t do work on Saturdays, that includes homework. It’s our day to spend with and focus on God.
I’m graduating from high school this year so if passed the law wouldn’t affect me, but I’m worried about my fellow Seventh-Day Adventist students and also Jewish students. I also fear that they won’t be given the rights entitled to them by the Constitution because this country has a tendency to to away our rights.
Also, the high school I go to is not a normal high school. It’s a public high school, but you have to apply to get in. We work at accelerated pace, having only four classes each semester and finishing those classes in that amount of time. We also have centers for each subject (math center, science center, business center, social studies center) where all grade levels (9-12) are in the same centers. We are given PAKS (personal activity kits) with which we can work independently or with our friends. We usually have a week to work on each Pak, with a seminar once a week. At the end of the week you go to the testing center to take the test. This school can be really stressful at times because of all the work you are required to do in a short amount of time, but if Obama’s proposal became a law it would be practically impossible to be able to finish our paks. We wouldn’t have any time. My high school, which is one of the top 10 schools in the Houston area, and also nominated for the Blue ribbon 2010, would have to cease to exist.
I was also wondering. Does anybody know if this proposal has been brought before congress yet?
January 4th, 2010 at 9:01 pm
Alright I’m not completely opposed to the idea of a longer school year. Nor am I opposed to the longer school days. I do believe that the United States is behind academically. If this is to pass, and the school year becomes longer as well as the day; Then I believe that education also needs to be reformed. Quality not quantity is the way to go. Sure increase the quantity, but counter balance it with quality. The main argument for students nowadays has been their concern of when exactly will they use certain information. Students are confined in a classroom for almost the whole day. I believe that education needs to be taken outside of the classroom, and integrated into living. I’m suggesting a type of field based learning. Show them what working adults do. Teaching math? Take them to a bridge, have them analyze the bridge, introduce the math skills. Introducing Shakespeare? Take them to a theater production, then get them into the reading. Students learn and remember only the things that interest them, so make their education interesting.
January 5th, 2010 at 10:21 am
I don’t agree with this at all. I’m a middle school student and I find this INSANE!!
Your taking away family time. Families teach more than the school! I know that from experience!!! My mom was a teacher in Joliet a long time ago and I agree with her. The problem is the teachers! Not the school days!!! So what if you could possibly give us more homework, most kids aren’t going to do it anyways because they’re learning the same thing from their parents, they can probably learn more from their parents too!
I agree with the stress and the depression, and yes it is a bunch of stuff we DON’T NEED!! We need better teachers so we can get more education in the SAME HOURS of the NORMAL SCHOOL DAY!
Homework is outragous. And if this is passed, then think of how many people will skip school, there’ll be more riots and more sucides and that leads to even more prisonors!
See anything wrong in the American lifestyle yet?!?
January 5th, 2010 at 10:34 am
There are tons of problems in the schools. I agree with Watchful Raven, and I agree with all of the people who disagree with this too!!! You should see how hard most of the kids work to get the grades they do get. And then for the theacher not to tell them what’s expected of them! If someone told them what is expected, we’d have less flunks and drop outs! If you really expect to go through with this, then count me out. I’ll move to Afganistan if I have to get a better education. I bet the Taliban gives the best education because they’ve gotten through America before! Why do the terrorists get better education? And I bet it’s becuase they’re told what is expected of them! And if they aren’t, then that sux big time.
:’( 
:O
January 7th, 2010 at 1:53 pm
oooooh…yeah the more we go to schoool the more we learn that’s my opinion..:) like Japanese people they had more schoool days i think that’s really GOOD.”:)
January 8th, 2010 at 4:05 pm
I do not want my children going to longer school days. This is not a place to dump off our kids because we can not find daycare. I like spending time with my kids and I like the fact that they have time to be kids and to play sports and be involved in musical activites. Other countries do not integrate their students with learning disabilities giving the impression that they are doing better. Teachers spend 80% of their school day helping children that need help making every child mediocre. Do you think China has classes with autistic children and children that have major learning disabilities? The bottom line is that you can not have it both ways. Other countries disregard these children and we don’t so our test scores appear to be not as good but we have plenty of extremely bright children in this country. So what if a bunch of test scores all added together don’t show it. Making the school day longer is not going to help anyone. This administration is clueless. You can not focus on family values if there will be no time for families to be a family.
January 8th, 2010 at 4:10 pm
There will be higher drop out rates as well…I hope all these high school kids that are paying attention to what Obama is doing will vote in 2012 because it is that younger generation that voted this “historic” figure in as president without knowing what he was planning!
January 9th, 2010 at 12:07 am
Obama is right. we need to step up to the plate.we need longer school years to help us out a bit more. although most of us don’t really agree with having to go to school longer, we are not even in the top 50 when it comes to education. We are the world’s richest country yet we can’t put money into education, instead we make school budget cuts and i’ve even seen schools close here in the bay area.(i live in San Jose). Our education system is pathetic and we need to solve it. Keep up with the good work Obama!
January 11th, 2010 at 6:53 pm
We have much more immediate problems to deal with…my kids are in Long Island and receiving a wonderful and challenging education already and the kindergarteners have full days!!!! Not a good a idea. Really hope this never actually comes into fruition.
January 13th, 2010 at 10:46 am
Although some students find this to be a very disrespectful act, they need to realize that we need a better education. I am a freshman in high school and I highly agree with Obama. When this will take place, Universities and colleges will have a bigger population because students would have better SAT averages. In conclusion, I say this proposal should be put in place.
January 13th, 2010 at 12:45 pm
This is a terrible idea. You can;t add school days to what we already have to deal with. You would have to pay teachers more salary, it causes more stress for us, it depends on how the teachers teach us, you would have to add more topics for them to teach us, kids wouldn’t be able to play their sports. I am a freshman and I completely disagree with extending school days. I’m not the greatest student, but I know adding more days will not maker me smarter.
January 16th, 2010 at 10:25 pm
I believe our President is correct in his thinking, but going at it in the wrong way. Expending the school day’s hour would be ridiculous and be no help at all with family matters, learning matters, etc.
However, if we extend the number of school days from180 to at least 200 or more, and keep the hours at 8 hours a day, then I would support this notion all the way!
January 19th, 2010 at 1:31 am
People are all ticked off about this, this was Obama’s plan from the start. Why the hell would you vote for him then complain about what he is doing when you knew that he was going to do. It just doesn’t make any sense. You all should have listened to McCain.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:53 am
I have NEVER been a obama supporter i have all ways been an HILLARY supporter but this plan of two more hours a day is a great. That is in my opion and I am in eighth grade I go to the awsome and best shcool in Indiana SALEM MIDDLE SHCOOL. compard to other shcools and people all over the globe we have the least shcool days. if it waS up to me i would want school two more hours a day and almost all year long and only get off for two or three months PS HILLARY NEEDED TO WIN SHE WOULD HAVE BEEN A LOT BETTER PRESIDENT THAN HIM.
January 22nd, 2010 at 10:25 pm
Ok so basically I disagree. People need to sleep. Like others have said the real problem is using the time efficienty. I’d say 60% of my life is school, but if it was more efficient it could be 30%. Teachers don’t spend the time correctyl. People need lifes. This will not help becasue people will just be more tired
January 24th, 2010 at 10:33 pm
i think instead of longer school it should be shortened so that way the students can take in what they learn each day better so it stays with them instead of trying to memorize so much stuff each day and it will ease the stress on them too which will keep them more focused
January 27th, 2010 at 12:29 am
Whine, bawl, cry. Most of what I have read posted is individualism. We need to improve the education of OUR kids. Getting out of a mess take sacrifice. Our problem is we want the improvement without the work and sacrifice. Good luck!
January 27th, 2010 at 1:45 am
Yeah, I’m a student but I’m not just saying that this idea is crazy because I don’t like school, I’m saying this because it’s true. At my school, you need a bus pass just to get on the bus. And you have to pay $120 for this pass, and since my school has furlough days, we’ll have to pay $120 EACH quarter. Plus, doesn’t anyone think about STRESS anymore? Longer schol days or a longer year just piles to a student’s stress level. I’m only in 8th grade and my two younger sisters are only in 7th and 1st grade which means my mother is STILL paying for school and those prices aren’t going down. When I get to high school, a regular school day is 2 HOURS! Imagine a longer school day than 2 hours! Longer school years aren’t any better. We have almost a whole year of school. Summer vacation is only two months! We don’t need the school year to be any longer than it already is.
January 27th, 2010 at 8:55 am
obama is right i think it would be a great idea to lengthen/extend school days
January 27th, 2010 at 10:47 am
this is a responce to ME above Me. If we go for shorter days it would make the united states look terrible and look at Japan they go for 243 days if we shorten the days and summer we would terrible to other countries. we need this to happen. Belive me we do not need shorter we need longer Because the average states right now is low and if we raise theese hours and shorten the summer vaccation it will boost the united states up verry much.!!!!!!!!!!
January 27th, 2010 at 10:28 pm
This is just ridiculous. Making school days and hours longer? I mean, this is AMERICA. NOT ASIA. (I am South Korean myself, and I am an honor student. Heh.) I do understand that he wants all of us to become successful in life and learn more, but we do have lives away from school. After school I always help my parents with errands and stuff, and then I have to do 3 hours of homework. By extending the school hours/days I might get more homework. I’m afraid I won’t be able to do that if school will end at 5 or 8 or maybe longer. Imagine having to eat the disgusting school foods for breakfast, lunch, AND dinner. (That is, if you eat the school lunch.) You should also think about how DARK it’s going to be if us kids get out of school around 8 pm. It’s going to be DARK. Some kids have to walk home, and imagine having to walk a long way home in the DARK. Especially if you’re a girl. It’s even scarier.
From reading the previous comments, the teachers who actually have experience from teaching in schools are right. They don’t get paid much, they need a numerous amount of time in order to come up with new teaching ideas/correcting tests and or homework. Imagine having to correct about 500 papers within 3 days, along with having to take care of yourself and your family.
..So this is a bad idea. Just please.. don’t.
January 31st, 2010 at 6:20 pm
Has no one said that some students depend on school for social life?
February 2nd, 2010 at 3:16 pm
Ok, I am in Middle School, and it is hard enough of how many hours i have to sit at my desk. Most of the kids in my class don’t pay attention after lunch. If he thinks its going to be easy he needs to go sit his butt in a class room for 7 hours and see if he still thinks the same thing. Kids have lives! If you make the school days longer we would have a lot of people skipping dropping out and mad parents. A lot of depressed kids. I have friends and i barley get to talk to them as it is right now. I think that Obama should push the time we have to be there till like 9:00. Cause i have to fix my hair put my makeup on and get ready eat breakfast and i am usually late for school. If we go to school longer we will have all these things we learned in one day. If you voted for Obama to be president i respect that you have a opinion, but i don’t like the things he has in mind. I think what this whole thing is about is a race to see who can be the best country. Someday in the future the school days are going to be a full year if our countries keep racing to see who is the best! The teachers at my school even complain about how much work they have to do and they cant help us in class because of all of this work. If the teachers are having troubles then i think he is already pushing the limit…..Just keep it the way it is.
February 3rd, 2010 at 10:16 am
I think this is not a bad idea. You all may think I’m crazy but the reason why we’re in recession is because people are saving money so the answer here is not save money is spend money. If we have more school days we’ll need to pay more money. Therefore, more jobs will be needed, more help. I think this is a great idea. I think this will get us out of the hole we’re in and I wouldn’t mind being in school for 243 days. It sounds like fun
February 3rd, 2010 at 1:27 pm
I think this is a bad plan. I am student currently enrolled in one of the best schools in the country(we made top 100). Being apart of this school I have no free time. I am constantly doing work to keep above a 2.5 GPA and hours on top of hours of homework after school i have a Scholarship program that i have to go to on Wednesday after school till 8:30 and one Saturday a month from 8 till 5. All of these programs have their own homework. I am a very stressed kid and im only in the 9th grade. i honestly think i will keel over if more days or hours are added on. Summer is a time also for camps and things to go to. I plan on going to an engineering camp this summer but if the days were extended into summer instead of learning things i want im stuck learning things i allready know. Do not extend days.
February 3rd, 2010 at 3:47 pm
Me too!
February 3rd, 2010 at 8:22 pm
Education standards need to be raised. More school days, no matter how difficult this appears to be need to be added. Teachers race lessons in order to cram what needs to be taught. Ultimately more days, leads to more and better learning.
February 4th, 2010 at 10:49 pm
obama needs to calm down if he hasnt noticed we have enough school.
February 10th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
this is a bad idea because you strees with school and have no free time or if they extend school days it would be less summer that means less free time for us.So you would be always streesed with hw.NNNNNNOOOOO EXTENDED SCHOOL DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!PLEASE THIINK AL ADULTS IF YOU WERE A KID AND HADED MORE WORK=BORING AND STRESSING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
February 10th, 2010 at 5:02 pm
Education standards need to be raised. More school days, no matter how difficult this appears to be need to be added. Teachers race lessons in order to cram what needs to be taught. Ultimately more days, leads to more and better learning.
February 10th, 2010 at 5:02 pm
I strongly disagree with that because we need time for ourseleves to relax and play. Even dough its good to study it might be to much for us and we can get bored!
February 10th, 2010 at 5:11 pm
extended school days just stres kids because we have lifes!Of all the strees and desesperation of extra days we throw it at our parents also homework barely make us do things in the afternoon if days or hours are added so it will be unfair.Why do we learn what we already now because for what we are gonna use that extra days?FOR NOTHING.Like for example if im in 8 grade and we already now everything we are not going to start learning physics because thaths for 9 graders!Do you see extending school days its a waste of time for us also it will be more expensive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
February 10th, 2010 at 5:12 pm
mkay lets get this clear im telling u right now! that if this idea passes guess what…MORE LIKELY THAT KIDS WILL GIVE UP AND DROP OUT OF HIGH SCHOOL MEANING THAT THERE WILL BE MORE PEOPLE OUT ON THE STREETS!! I mean so what that korea or japan have longer school days. WHO CARES. Dosent mean they are any better of a country.Im a teenager. and if this ever happens my ass will be gone! stupid idea!! and btw im not makeing incorrect spelling marks on purpose im using slang.so dont even go there.
February 10th, 2010 at 5:15 pm
I do not want my children going to longer school days. This is not a place to dump off our kids because we can not find daycare. I like spending time with my kids and I like the fact that they have time to be kids and to play sports and be involved in musical activites. Other countries do not integrate their students with learning disabilities giving the impression that they are doing better. Teachers spend 80% of their school day helping children that need help making every child mediocre. Do you think China has classes with autistic children and children that have major learning disabilities? The bottom line is that you can not have it both ways. Other countries disregard these children and we don’t so our test scores appear to be not as good but we have plenty of extremely bright children in this country. So what if a bunch of test scores all added together don’t show it. Making the school day longer is not going to help anyone. This administration is clueless. You can not focus on family values if there will be no time for families to be a family.
February 10th, 2010 at 5:24 pm
For the record I am an average student I get good grades. So please don’t think that I’m just saying all this because I’m lazy and don’t want more work. I do all my work. I can handle it. Give me more I will drop out or commit suicide. I ANT PLAYIN! lol
February 10th, 2010 at 7:55 pm
No, he doesn’t.
February 10th, 2010 at 8:07 pm
I agree with you, R.
February 16th, 2010 at 9:12 am
Hey i think that adding more days to school is unexeptebal!!!!!!!!!!
bc makinking kids be at school more of the year and longer hours will make our kids not wanna do nuthin bc it will be boarin and bad for them. they will not wanna go to college and do other things bc of their childhood at school. sooo u wanna add more school days wait till tha future it will be all ur faught colleges and other schools will loose money.!!!!!!!!!!!!! bc of all tha education that they had and they will be board with it.
Also making the kids stay at school longer hours and longer days they will get tired of it and our test scores and stuff for tha county will be bad. bc of tha fact u made them be at school for soooooooooo long and they got tired of it!!!!!!! bc our children need time off to!!!
soooooo nooooooo more longer schoool!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
February 16th, 2010 at 9:21 am
Heyy! i think that it’s unexceptebal too having more days in school because theres a reason kids have time off so they need a break and have funn with there friends and your not helping us at all. And like children if they have more school, than they will just get tired and boared and come to school half asleep. So putting kids in school longer wont help because kids can only take soo much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. So if your willing to put kids in school longer don’t do it because it’s just wasting our time and the teachers and our family’s because would you want to spend your time in school i wouldn’t think so because that’s just cruel because you know that there not going to do what you want them to do. And the school that some kids is going to has a new principle has made tons of changes already and there kinda good changes and kinda not so please do not make us go to school longer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
February 16th, 2010 at 9:30 am
Hey! I think that making school longer is not goooood!!!!!!!!!! here are my reasons……
Well one reason is that yall should not give us more school! Um and kids will not wanna go to school soo they wilkl try to miss school more. there will be a lot of absences in the school bc kids will be tired and not wanna go. i mean kids dont wanna go now but just wait if u make more days that will just make them not wanna go more and much less at all.!!!!!!!!!!
sooo before u do it u better think and dnt do it!!!!!!
you listen now! if you put kids in school longer they will come to school half asleep and some parents want there kids to learn and listen to the teachers not to come to school and sleep and when your tired ya get cranky and i bet you dont want tha kids to be cranky soo DO NOT PUT KIDS IN SCHOOL LONGER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
February 16th, 2010 at 4:29 pm
Hi, i must say fantastic website you have, i stumbled across it in Bing.
February 22nd, 2010 at 4:18 pm
I think a school year should be all year long and only sundays off. And also no summer vacation!
February 22nd, 2010 at 9:27 pm
i think it is good
February 23rd, 2010 at 3:37 pm
Mia Lindsay my teacher says that you need more time in the class room because you cant spell opposed right…..so your opinon is unvalid.
February 24th, 2010 at 9:56 am
i dont like more school days
February 24th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
I think that this should not be allowed im only 14 but we are being stressed out enough and i cant take it. We have our own chores at home and i barely am getting them all done correctly because i have to do my homework it will be hard on all of us and i think that parents should have the rite to chose. Just because other nations are smarter we got better weapons then them and i think we should always remember that.
February 25th, 2010 at 12:46 pm
i m from korea and i hate school anyway.
February 26th, 2010 at 11:06 am
i dont want more school days,coz make us kids stress and bored
March 2nd, 2010 at 11:53 am
Cassy Deen. First off you are 14 you are a freshman. You don’t know what homework is. And second. Violence doesn’t solve anything. Look at the conflict in Iraq. What has that gotten us? Huh? NOTHING! Weapons don’t solve anything.
March 2nd, 2010 at 11:55 am
I think this is not a bad idea. You all may think I’m crazy but the reason why we’re in recession is because people are saving money so the answer here is not save money is spend money. If we have more school days we’ll need to pay more money. Therefore, more jobs will be needed, more help. I think this is a great idea. I think this will get us out of the hole we’re in and I wouldn’t mind being in school for 243 days. It sounds like fun
March 3rd, 2010 at 3:32 pm
I think it’s a not very good idea. Children need more free time…
March 7th, 2010 at 12:39 pm
It is not a good idea to extends school hours because this is likely to cause the students to rebel.
March 9th, 2010 at 10:26 am
[...] improve failing schools across the country. The grant gives schools four options for improvement: extending instructional hours, converting to charter schools, closing the school, or replacing the principal and half of the [...]
March 12th, 2010 at 6:13 am
This is ridiculous. It’s unfair to compare American standards with those of other countries- the cultural history and attitudes surrounding education are completely different and it’s impossible to transform these things with a strategy as ignorant as increasing time spent in school. In Asian countries especially, kids value education in a way that our culture never has and most likely never will. Meeting parents’ and teachers’ expectations is of utmost importance there, and it’s this attitude that motivates kids to work hard in school. Trying to change the present state of American education in Obama’s proposed manner will be disastrous because kids just don’t have the mindset to cope with it. American kids catch the school bus at 6:30 am and don’t return home until evening because they participate in extra-curricular activities to enhance their college applications. Teenagers are put under FAR too much pressure as it is and it is simply unhealthy. All Obama’s plan will do is increase kids’ frustration and boredom. How about trying to improve quality of curriculum and teaching instead?!?! Or dealing with the real problems that interfere with kids’ learning such as drugs, bullying, family issues, etc.??? This really upsets me.
March 12th, 2010 at 6:22 pm
I think Obama’s train of thought is derailed
March 13th, 2010 at 4:13 pm
China is kicking are ass in school days. we are on are way to becoming a dumb county.. yes to more school days we should match china
March 13th, 2010 at 11:23 pm
First of all, I would like to address the fact that I am indeed a student. Second of all, me disagreeing with this ridiculous plan isn’t really making a huge dent on this discussion because it looks like EVERYBODY is disagreeing with it as well. I am an 11th grader and think that this is the stupidest proposal that I have ever heard of. I am incredibly involved in my school; I take duel enrolled, AP, and honors classes, I am in 6 clubs-officer of one, and I am in the marching band, which will pretty much consume your life for the first half of the year. Not to mention, I take 3 dance classes a week and also attend church 3 times a week. I am a busy girl and also try my hardest to make time for my family and friends, while maintaining at least a 3.5 gpa. My daily schedule on a weekday consists of waking up at 5:30 in the morning, leaving my house at 6:15, school starts at 7:30, I get out at 2:30, get home at 3:15, finish homework around 7, eat and go to bed. This is excluding band practice. During the first half of the school year, band practice is after school until 5:30 on tuesdays and thursdays. My normal tuesday would be the same until school ends. at 2:30, I go straight to band practice, get out at 5:30, go straight to dance class, get out at 8:45, get home around 9:20, leaving me doing homework until 2 in the morning, not even getting to eat dinner and having to wake up 3 and a half hours later. I’m not the only student with a busy schedule. I know tons of students with even busier schedules and even have a part time job. What our ignorant president doesn’t realize is that even though we are young, WE STILL HAVE LIVES OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL. Our parents still expect for us to pay for our own things. Most of us have extra curricular activities that we love doing to keep us out of trouble. What ever happened to family time? This is why teenagers can’t get along with their parents anymore- because we don’t have time to spend time with them anymore. Going to school these days is extremely stressful. Stress leads to depression. And you wonder why teenagers overdose on drugs and why most are so misunderstood?
Give us a break. Seriously. We already have 7 hours of school, and then go home and do 5 hours of homework (if you take challenging classes).
Enough about the students. WHAT ABOUT THE TEACHERS? I’m not even going to say more about this topic.
There are so many things wrong with this idiotic idea of “our leader.”
March 15th, 2010 at 5:27 pm
I’m all for it, as long as he shortens the school year.
Go Obama!!!!!!!!!
March 16th, 2010 at 1:03 am
[...] Obama’s new education reforms will require high schools to better prepare students for continuing their higher education and will more fully emphasize academic achievement than the previous No Child Left Behind program. [...]