Four-Day School Week Research Database
This interactive tool is a comprehensive collection of all empirical research that has been done on the four-day school week as of May 2023. The literature was compiled as part of a scoping review, which involves an exhaustive search of the literature base on a topic to explore what areas have been studied and what work still needs to be done to better understand the topic.
This tool can help you answer the question: What empirical research has been done on the four-day school week for my population of interest?
Using the tool:
Filters
- Using the filters, you can select a variety of characteristics – location, student demographics, outcomes, and others – and the table will auto-populate all the studies that included schools or students that meet those criteria.
- A complete list of definitions for each filter option can be found in the Glossary.
Map
- The map offers a quick way to filter by state. Click on the state of interest and the table will only present studies that include that state.
- To switch to another state, re-click the state or click the Reset Filter button.
Table Information
- The table includes a link to the research publication, as well as webpage information for the corresponding author (when available). If you have questions regarding a study, please contact the corresponding author directly. Many researchers are happy to discuss their work and answer questions you might have regarding their research.
- Selecting the Glossary tab provides descriptions of terms in the table.
- Selecting the Summary Statistics tab will provide you with frequency tables of characteristics from studies meeting your criteria based on the filters you have selected.
Missing Data
- Many researchers did not report key information, such as student race/ethnicity or what schools did on the fifth day of the week. Please note that if your filters do not return any studies researchers have not studied those populations OR simply did not report if they did.
- 54% of studies did not report anything about what schools did on the fifth day.
- 60% of studies did not report student race/ethnicity.
Recommended researchers to contact:
Most studies we identified were student papers (n = 70, 63%; dissertations, theses, and undergraduate papers). These can still offer useful information given your population of interest, but many of these authors may no longer be in a research role. Below is a table of researchers who led the most articles and are still actively involved in studying the four-day school week.
We recommend you contact these authors first for further information regarding their research on the four-day school week.