Obama: Longer school days and school years needed

I was looking up New Zealand recently and read that they do 4 ten-week terms, with couple/three weeks in between, and a little bit longer break in the summer. Their school year starts Jan/Feb and ends November-ish, and Christmas is in the middle of their summer....

 

We live in a rural area and the local kids have to travel over a half hour to get to school on the bus. Actually, the schools are only about 20-25 minutes away but with picking everyone up and dropping them off, I think the ride is like an hour long. So, schools starts at like 7:30 and gets out at 3, I think. They have to get up two hours before school starts to get there on time and they get home at least an hour after it ends.

That is already a 10 hour day. How could they possibly squish any more time into the school day? And how ridiculous is it that they NEED 8 hours to complete the work? 4 hours is a LONG day for us, typically we are at about 3 and a half.

 

I KNOW!!! They could play CD's of math facts on the bus ride!!! Like HS'ers do, lol!!!

My dss would go from his high school to an elementary school, and sit for a half-hour on the bus waiting for them to let out. He lept telling me he did his homework "on the bus", and I told him he COULDN'T do it while riding on the bus!!! Finally I realized he did it while WAITING on the bus, which was actually a good use of his time!