ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - The Fox C-6 School District continues to look for ways to cut their budget, and moving to a four-day school week is an option they're considering.
According to the Missouri Independent, 30% of the state's districts have adopted the shortened week - serving 11% of the state's students.
The Superintendent of the Fox C-6 district, Dr. Paul Fregeau, said they're looking to make this change to attract more teachers. But it's also a budget reduction strategy.
"Our primary reason for looking at it, is we need to right size our budget moving forward and research has come out that it's about a two to 3% savings," Dr. Fregeau said.
He said that could save as much as $3.2 million for the district each year.
Meanwhile, State Senator Doug Beck (D-Affton) is pushing a bill (SB 784), that would require districts with more than 30,000 residents to hold a five-day school week, unless a majority of voters are in support of a four-day week.
The Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education would then provide districts and charter schools with a five-day school week an incentive amount of 2% of the school's aid to increase teacher salaries.
"It would have a fiscal impact of $100 million a year," Beck said. "So over 10 years, that would be a billion dollars put back into our public schools."
Beck noted the four-day school week is most likely putting a strain on parents and students.
"That puts a burden on the families and some families have different incomes that harms them even more," Beck said. "If we do this in our more urban, suburban settings, now you're gonna have kids that are older with nothing to do one day a week."
SB 784 had a hearing last week, and Beck said he hopes it's voted out of committee this week.
For the Fox C-6 School, and any others who want to attend, they're hosting a community conversation on the four-day school week tonight at 6:30 p.m. at the Fox Service Center.