The Finance Ministry supports changing Friday from a school day to a day off.

BOOOOOOO

It would not be so bad if.....

What's going on?

Relevant offices have been studying the effects of what it sees as a discrepancy between the work and vacation days of parents versus the school and vacation days of children. There is a big discrepancy, with many parents not working Fridays yet the children have school (half day), and many days where the parents have to work, such as during Hanukkah, Isru Chag, long summer vacation and other such days yet the children have vacation from school.

The effect of this, as has been discovered, is a big hit to the economy. It seems some parents don't bother joining the workforce out of concern what will be on those days they have to go to work yet the kids have no school. Many other parents do go to work but have to find solutions for those days, such as taking vacation or paying babysitters to watch the kids.

This is a big problem for many families, but the Ministry of Finance, and the Bank of Israel, are looking at it from the perspective of hot i affects the economy. They believe the effect is a cost of 250 million shekels each year from these days of lost productivity.

To lessen the negative effect on the economy, they are proposing cancelling school on Fridays. In its place would be an option day of enrichment with some sort of optional extracurricular activities programming.
source: Ynet

Unless I am misunderstanding, I do not see them proposing that instead of Fridays the children would have school on Hanukkah and Isru Chag and some of the summer vacation will be cancelled. They are simply doing away with Fridays. While it might be nice to have the possibility of a family day on Friday, I do not see how it helps the parents or the economy on all those other days.

In addition, turning Fridays into an optional day of enrichment will be an extra financial burden on the parents, or it won't be because many parents will opt not to send the children because of the extra charge. They will be increasing the par between wealthy and needy, or the wanting, with only the wealthy being given access to enrichment activities.

Besides for that, I like my Friday mornings without the children home.

If they were making up for the Fridays by having school on Isru Chag and Hanukkah and shortening the summer vacation, that would be great. It would put the various systems more in sync. Just cancelling the Friday school-day is not, in my opinion, a reasonable solution.