There’s no school on Fridays at Jefferson High School or Lincoln Public Schools.

The majority of students, faculty and staff have a positive view about attending school for four longer days and getting a three-day weekend every week at the two rural schools outside of the Queen City.

“Students seem more energized, more productive and happy,” said Lincoln music teacher Holly Dybsetter while admitting she is too.

Lincoln English teacher Cindy Brady said this is the first year in her 13 years at the school that students aren’t missing a lot of school because of sports.

This year, for example, there are 66 students in the high school and 40 are either in volleyball or football.

“It was very frustrating as a teacher to have two-thirds of your class gone for sport,” Brady said. “I’m really glad my classes are full.”

Lincoln Principal Laurie Maughan said in- and out-of-school suspensions were down 43 percent for the first quarter.

Other schools that moved to a four-day school week had the same outcome, so Maughan was hopeful the same would happen in Lincoln.

“I didn’t expect it to be so drastic though,” she said.

The student survey in Lincoln found that students were more rested because of the three-day weekend.

“Everybody seems to be calmer, and there’s more optimism in the building,” Maughan said.

The majority of those surveyed in Boulder seem to be happy with the change as well.

Superintendent and JHS Principal Jim Whealon said student and teacher morale has improved with the change.

On question, “I enjoy school more knowing I have a three-day weekend,” solicited 73 strongly agree and 44 agree responses of the 204 surveyed. Similar figures came in with the question, “I have more time to complete homework.”

Additionally, the teacher absenteeism rate is half of what it was the first quarter last year at JHS.

Cody Rosenbaum, JHS senior, said he wasn’t supportive of the change at first, but has since changed his mind.

“I was really hoping that schools days would get shorter — I wasn’t in favor of longer days,” Rosenbaum said. “But having a three-day weekend is really fun.”

Academically speaking, the change has been good for Rosenbaum as well. This was the first time in he’s ever earned a 4.0 GPA.

One big adjustment was the longer days, and students in Annette Gardener’s fifth grade class in Lincoln, aren’t sold on the concept.

Orrin Dailey says by the time he gets done with school at 4 p.m. he’s very hungry and tired.

If Madison McCosco could have her way, she says she’d go back to a five-day week.

Morgan Burris says she’d rather be in school too.

“I just don’t like it,” Burris said. “I don’t feel like I’m getting enough education.”

Lincoln and Boulder aren’t the only small Montana communities making the change to a four-day school week. The Alberton School District made the change last year and followed Victor and Arlee.

Students who attend schools that are in session four days a week have the same number of classroom instruction time — 1080 hours — during the school year, which is the state standard.

There are 13 counties in the state that have schools on a four-day school week schedule, according to the Office of Public Instruction.

State Superintendent Denise Juneau said part of the reason for requiring a certain number of days in school instead of hours was to provide flexibility for schools to have that local control.

Juneau said four-day weeks aren’t the only option schools are exploring — starting later in the day is another — but the trend seems to be to the four-day school week.

“We are watching it very closely right now to see how academic development is working in those communities,” she said.

During the 2006-07 school year, eight school districts adopted a four-day school week, Juneau said. “By extending the hours of the school day, these schools changed their school calendar from 180 pupil instruction days to 145 pupil instruction days,” she explained in an e-mail.

During the 2008-09 annual data collection cycle, 18 public school districts and one accredited nonpublic district (Two Eagle River) indicated operating on a four-day week, says Juneau. Twelve districts are small rural schools administered by the county superintendent. The largest district has 328 students and the smallest district has two students, she added.

It’s a big change for schools to undertake, Juneau said, but if districts make the deliberate change with thought and community buy-in, she’s optimistic it will be successful.

Matt Allen has taught industrial tech in Boulder for nearly two decades and says the change has made a big improvement in teacher morale, which last year was very low.

“I think it’s helping a lot of students too because they are better rested after a three-day weekend,” Allen said.

On any average week, Allen said students are getting 20 to 30 more minutes of time in the lab, to weld, or draft because they don’t have so many transitions.

Laura Nicolai, a Lincoln mother of three, admits she was surprised to see how well the change has worked for her family.

“Academically, my children’s scores all went up,” she said. “Everything is so focused. They have more time in the classroom with the teacher one on one and they aren’t being hurried from one class to another.”

Because Nicolai works on the weekends, having Fridays off has provided opportunities for more family time, like a recent trip to visit the ancient cedar forest in Libby.

“I would really be cranky if they went back to five days,” she said. “I’d be camping on their doorstep. I can’t see one negative as far as we are concerned.”

Reporter Alana Listoe: 447-4081 or alana.listoe@helenair.com