This reasoning is totally absurd and shows how much our country cares for a newborn life. Yes the baby's body resides in the mother's body but how does respecting one person's body justify the destroying of another's? If it was accidental or a split decision or a financial burden there's this thing called ADOPTION!!!! You don't need to destroy the baby because you feel it's an inconvienience. Really? Since when do we murder somebody JUST TO MAKE OURSELVES FEEL BETTER! It's so sad this is even an issue. Mother Theresa once said "Give the child to me. Don't kill the child. I will take any child whose mother would abort it". If only we all had that sentiment......

I think it is funny how little we need in a definition of life if we found life on Mars, compared to the definition of life we need to kill an unborn baby here on Earth.....

I think the idea was to reduce the time kids were in school not even out the hours or quite possibly add time to what they have already. If we were trying to reduce how long kids were in school, why would we then make school all year round? That seems counter intuitive. clarification please?

I don't know whether this is support for the topic of a shorter school week or against but i wholeheartedly agree. Kids don't all learn the same. Pertaining to the topic i was going to mention this anyway because in the current public school model of classrooms, students don't get hardly any individualized attention. in classrooms of 20 to 25 students (some even larger than that) there is simply no way to give any one child the attention they need without compromising time with the other students. Yes we have tutoring and homework but if we are going to do a lot of that then why have a classroom at all? This is why so many parents are opting for homeschooling or alternative schooling (like online classrooms) making it feasible to not even have a five day school week.

"Finally, I think it's amusing that your profile was created literally the same hour you responded to my comment and the number of participations you've had could be counted on one hand. You chose to join, literally, so you could throw home schooling back at me and tell me parents don't matter. You're likely just another fake extra avatar from one of the regulars who stirs things up in here."

Yes, I'm new here. I wanted to flex my debate muscles and one must start somewhere. I didn't say anywhere that parents don't matter. I wasn't trying to throw home schooling in your face either (although i do agree with it) but it is a common tactic of people who oppose shorter school weeks to mention those......

"As for "what a parent does during those school hours should NOT be taken into account" you already simply don't understand that entire communities had input into what exists now as the school system. School committees, PTAs, teachers, government oversight agencies, attorneys for the oppressed or disadvantaged, student body governments, all for many decades have had a voice which collectively evolved to what we have now. It's an insult to every advocate who ever stuck up for the students to imply that the adults are wreckless and selfish for not having a three day school week."

All that and you don't talk about what is best for the kids. Who cares what committees or attorneys or government branches think its a good idea or a bad idea? If its not best for the students then it shouldn't be in existence.

"That's a scenario you dreamed up. The reasons for homeschooling overwhelmingly are religion or paranoia about safety."

It's not something i dreamed up. Its been talked about for years. While I was in college for teaching, we talked about the pro's and con's of kids having too much time spent in school. Also under the statistics provided by you it would be listed as "others". And you do know that some schools are already doing four day school weeks, right? So its not a dreamed up scenario.....

I agree. Spiderman would totally win. Both men are both battle seasoned with many many fights under their belts but Spiderman has a huge advantage over Batman. His spider sense. Whatever Batman sends at Spiderman wouldn't matter. Spiderman would see it coming. Batarangs? dodge. Smoke bombs? saw it. Punches and kicks? easily evaded.....

The controversy is that kids are in school too much. Having so many kids in a publicly run institution for so many hours in a day makes many parents wary. That is why so many parents have their kids in homeschool.

If it were somehow decided that kids were in school too much and there needed to be a four day or even a three day school week, what a parent does during those school hours should NOT be taken into account. We can't say children should go to school more because parents work and can't watch them. Schools aren't babysitting services even if they are being reduced to that. We are deciding what is best for children after all....