This Sunday, The New York Times ran a story detailing the trend of three-day weekends on college campuses. Some campuses want to “reclaim” Fridays, i.e. regulate the academic calendar more strictly so that departments are required to schedule more Friday classes.
An increase in Friday instruction time would reduce the abundance of classes that occur midweek and battle one another for room space and student enrollment. Administrators claim that more Friday classes will benefit students because a larger variety of classes and class times can be offered.
Alongside mandating more Friday class offerings, these schools may also demand that earlier class times strive to be the norm. Both Chico State and Duke University have increased their Friday, as well as early morning, classes.
However, as mentioned in the article, students make great efforts to work their schedule around factors such as the early mornings and Fridays. If students are already choosing to give up classes in favor of sleeping in, why offer them more early morning classes?
The theory goes that university life should mirror “real life,” the life that students will lead once they graduate from college. The problem with the logic of “get used to it now so you’re ready for it later” is the fact that such reasoning paints a static picture of the world at large. In truth, it is the rest of the world that needs a change: College students are wise in their reasoning that schedules should be internally, rather than externally, determined.
Administrators believe that they know best what schedule college students need. Chancellor Charles B. Reed of the California State University system says that partying instead of studying on Thursday nights “is not a healthy atmosphere.”
How Chancellor Reed defines a healthy atmosphere is unclear. Is it healthy to manipulate campus scheduling in order to slyly induce students into attending school five days a week?
A main concern of many college administrators is that without the crunch of Friday classes, students engage in raucous partying Thursday night. However, this concern is related to a more general issue – alcohol consumption by college students. The problem of student drinking will not disappear with an upsurge in Friday class requirements; students will simply hold off on their alcohol consumption for a night or two. What difference does it make to administrators if students are wasted on Thursday night or on Friday night? Or both? It is not the responsibility of a university to regulate the social life or social schedule of students.
It is no surprise that college officials have once more promoted the image of students as party animals in desperate need of structure. However, increasing early morning and Friday classes begs the question: Why should education be a masochistic experience for students?
It shouldn’t. Students should be allowed to enjoy and excel in school at a pace to their own liking. If a student can maintain a reasonable GPA and meet their graduation date, administrators shouldn’t bother trying to tweak scheduling preferences. If departments don’t wish to schedule Friday classes and students don’t wish to attend them, then a Friday class demand will only result in the poor emotional state of everyone on campus.
Furthermore, students, and people in general, deserve their free time, and school administrators are dead wrong in their assumption that Fridays-off equals a three-day weekend. In fact, a majority of college students devote at least a portion, if not all, of their Saturdays and Sundays to completing essays, reading and other long-term class projects. Taking away the opportunity of free Fridays would, for many students, completely eradicate the dream of a work-free, pressure-free weekend.
And any university official who thinks that students need a higher number of productive days on campus should take a serious look at the mental health statistics of college students. Surveys in the late 1990s from the National Mental Health Association report suicide as the second highest cause of death among college students and say that anxiety and depression are much too common among students. Making it harder for students to take a three-day breath of fresh air from the university will force already overworked students into a high-stress atmosphere.
School officials looking to increase Friday classes should also remember that for students juggling classes and employment, the ability to schedule academia-free days is key to finding a job. Students are able to tell potential employers that they are available all day three days a week, rather than being able to work for only a few hours after the school day has ended.
Students are not single-minded party animals looking to avoid school work and have a drunken hullabaloo three days a week. Rather, college students, like adults in general, enjoy the ability to schedule their work and their play. School administrators shouldn’t encourage a five-day week if students can, and want to, do their required academic work in four days.

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