A New York City charter school is boosting enrollment by offering a 12-hour day, including breakfast and dinner, at no extra cost to parents, reports Troy Closson in the New York Times.
Brooklyn Charter School in the gentrifying Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood, lost 30 percent of enrollment during the pandemic, he writes. The new schedule has made up most of that loss, drawing about 80 new students.
The school day runs from 8:30 am to 4 pm. Before and after classes, aides and counselors staff activities for earlybirds and latebirds. Few students stay for the full 12 hours.
"After-school programs, especially high-quality ones, can help improve a child’s attendance, academics and other measures of well-being, including mental health," writes Closson.
At Brooklyn Charter, a few dozen students arrive at 7, he writes. "They read books and tell stories in an auditorium under the watchful eye of a social worker."
After the school day ends at 4, dinner is served. Then it's time for activities, such as drumming, and homework help.
"By 6:30 p.m., only about five students were left," writes Closson.
As a candidate for president in 2019, Kamala Harris proposed a 10-hour school day to relieve working parents' child-care burdens.
It seems depressing to me. When my daughter was in early elementary school, she went to after-school care several days a week. (I was working 25 hours a week.) She was very social at school, but by then she just wanted to read a book by herself. She could only handle so much group time.
Some parents want more in-home learning, writes Keri D. Ingraham on RealClear Education. In a 2024 poll, half of parents would prefer their child learn from home at least one day a week, she writes. Ten percent say their first choice is full-time homeschooling, while 39 percent say the idea is a hybrid schedule with their child at home for one to four days a week and at school on other days.
That surprises me. Hybrid schedules were very unpopular during the pandemic. But, perhaps some parents who are working from home or full-time caregivers want their kids at home more of the time.