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Kamala Harris Proposes 10-Hour School Day
Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is introducing a Senate bill to keep kids in school from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. The proposed goal is to align schedules between the average school day and workday. While this might be convenient for working parents, it would trap students in classrooms for 10 hours, five days a week.
The actual goal is something different: strengthening teachers’ unions, federalizing local schools, and further replacing the family with the state.
In a glowing profile, Mother Jones attempts to sell Harris’s plan:
The majority of schools days end around 3 p.m., two hours before the end of 70 percent of parents’ workdays. And most schools don’t have a way to make up the difference. Fewer than half of all elementary schools—and fewer than a third of low-income schools—offer after-school care. Beyond that misalignment, schools shut down, on average, for 29 days during the school year, the majority of which are reserved for professional development, parent-teacher conferences, and myriad vacations and minor holidays the federal government doesn’t recognize. That’s a full two weeks’ worth of days more than what the average American has in holidays, vacation, and paid leave combined. And then, of course, there’s summer vacation, a two- to three-month break that leaves working parents scrambling for day-long care.
The school day and calendar is a bad deal for children: In the absence of a better alternative, 3 percent of elementary-school students and 19 percent of middle-school students look after themselves from 3 to 6 p.m. on school nights. But it’s an equally bad deal for working parents—and the economy as a whole. A family paying out of pocket to cover child care for those two hours between the end of the school and workday costs an average of $6,600 dollars per year, or nearly 10 percent of an average family’s income. Almost 40 percent of all workers lack access to any paid vacation time, which means parents will often have to scale back their workday to accommodate child care duties.
In that case, why not eliminate half the holidays and cut summer vacation to a week? That way, unmotivated parents could be even less involved with their kids and focus on what’s really important: sending more tax dollars to Washington.
Published in Education, Elections
Also tried in the US, Australia, and other places.
Our school district administrators proposed a four-day school week this year, which was rejected by the board, based on the reality that while teachers would love to have Fridays off, other people with kids in the private and public sectors who work five days a week would then have to figure out what to do with their school age kids on Friday.
I’d assume that if Harris is proposing those type of long daily school hours, tucked in their somewhere would be the same four days per week of classes (unless the goal is to just split the day between multiple teachers five days a week so the districts can hire more of them and union can get more members. Be hell on local taxpayers though, and even voters in California might get up in arms over that one).
I will not forget this…
Yah, but that sounds like the goal was more ethnic cleansing than education… I bet they would have been more careful and thoughtful about it with white children.
On a serious note though, if you think a bad home life is a major obstacle to good education having a boarding school option is not a crazy idea. It certainly is a more realistic solution than somehow making the home life better or more stable. At least from the schools perspective. You can’t send parents to detention for being irresponsible.
Also again being serious, the issue of parents having to do too much work would seem from a progressive perspective to be a better arguments of Elizabeth Warren and her arguments about the two income trap. In the past when you had more stay at home moms you didn’t have this “who will watch the kids issue”. Though I have to say, I grew up coming home to a house without my parents my older brother was there, but when he got to high school he started doing after school stuff I was on my own until like 6PM when the folks got back. You just turn on the TV watch afternoon cartoons, and make a sandwich. It’s not rocket science.
Though I think the real answer for modern society isn’t to actually have people work less. I think the solution is to make retirees play babysitters, by making it less viable for old people to be independent and live far away from their children. So the real answer is to cut social security benefits and strip people of retirement savings. Old people need to start earning their keep again.
Good point.
I see! So, even bachelors like you care about the future simply because you will have to live in it.
I don’t like her most of all.
I worked a year in a public school system with latch key/daycare after staying home at raising my own children for 10 years, and decided it was a poor system. In my experience, it was stressful for myself and the children. We were maxed out children to adult, and some of the children had behavior problems. I don’t think I read a whole story to a child in one sitting, because I kept having to get up and take care of a problem. If that is all you know, perhaps you don’t think it is so bad, and I only had my own time with my children to compare it to, but have absolutely no regrets about my children’s childhood. And we lived paycheck to paycheck most of the time.
I don’t advocate for full time school, I think some children need less as it is. As Charles Murray said, 1/2 the kids are below average, and they need to be seen as they are, not for what we imagine they can be. Edward Banfield also advocated reducing the time spent (years) as a way of addressing those who need more immediate rewards than prolonged education offers. Our kids spend more time in education systems than previous generations did, and we seem frustrated, and demand even more, and I wonder if that is the problem. It seems weird, but if your dog drinks anti freeze, an antidote is alcohol.
If we’re going to go full socialist, can’t we at least reduce working hours to match school hours rather than the other way ‘round? Even Kamala’s utopian dreams are dreary.
1919: “Your kids have to go to school.”
“But we need them to work in the fields!”
“This’ll make them smarter can make enough money to support a family.”
2019: “Your kids have to go to school for ten hours a day.”
“But we’ll never see them!”
“This is so your wife can also have a full-time job so you can make enough money to support a family.”