(This article comes courtesy of MissouriNet.)
Defeat of a proposed four-day school week has left a Missouri school board considering its next move to attract teachers and keep the ones it has. The St. Joseph School Board rejected the proposal from the school’s administration with three voting in favor and four against.
Board Vice President Kenneth Reeder opposed the plan. Still, Reeder said he sees value in the debate for the district.
“The best thing that has happened, I think, on this is that it’s raised the conversation of the importance of our school district to this town and also to the importance of getting this from 48 out of 50 states up somewhere higher in our teacher compensation,” Reeder told Missourinet affiliate KFEQ in St. Joseph.
The northwest Missouri school district serves more than 10,400 students. Reeder said he didn’t see the four-day school week as truly benefitting the district.
“A true levy just for teachers salary raises? I’m all in for that,” he said.
Board President LaTonya Williams voted in favor of the proposal. She said there has been a fallout since the board took its vote.
“Now our teachers feel undervalued and under supported,” she told KFEQ. “People are like, ‘Well, just pay the teachers more money. Pay the teachers more money.’ I would love to but where’s that money going to come from?”
Williams contended that the four-day school week was a way the district could benefit teachers at no cost to the district.
“After the board meeting and the resignations already coming in a day after the board meeting. I think that means something,” she said.
About 170 Missouri school districts hold classes four days a week.
