re: MO school district switches to 4 day week schedule due to teacher and funding shortage

As a teacher I can say a four day work week is not the answer. If you try and make the the day off a kind of independent study, it will fail badly. As has been said several times already, nobody goes into this profession believing they will get rich. However, a pay bump would help the situation that we're facing when it comes to a shortage of teachers. The main issues I see are the following, fix these and you'll get more people entering the profession.

1. Allow teachers to teach. Too many schools go with canned curriculums and are always trying to switch to the next best idea. As soon as teachers master the new methods, the school makes them change again. Leads to a lot of burn out and frustration and it rarely works.

2. Hold students and parents accountable. Our school has failed badly at this over the past decade, and we're still a good school. Our admin is terrified of parents and basically caves to their ever whim. By doing that, the kids have been running the show. It leads to defensive teachers and people scared that if they screw up, they'll be plastered all over social media. I have suggested many times sitting kids out of sports for a game or two, but we're told oh no we could never do that! If you don't show them you're serious, you'll never get control back.