Salina ? Interest in a four-day school week among school administrators looking for ways to save money is on the rise, according to a pair of superintendents whose districts already use the shorter week.

Usually Cheylin Supt. David Zumbahlen gets about five calls each year from administrators wondering about the district’s schedule, which includes longer days to compensate for the shorter weeks. This year, at least 15 administrators have called.

Weskan Supt. Dave DuBois, who is in his first year in the district, said he, just like Zumbahlen, had received several phone calls and e-mails inquiring about his district’s four-day weeks.

He guessed he had been contacted by at least a dozen districts from Kansas and Colorado. The interest has prompted Weskan administrators to put together a packet to send to districts that ask about the short week, DuBois said.

With the tight state of education funding, Zumbahlen is not surprised.

“Fifty-thousand is $50,000,” he said, quoting yearly savings for Cheylin, a Bird City district in Cheyenne County that switched to four-day weeks seven years ago.

Most savings come from transportation reductions, he said. The district of 176 students covers 688 square miles. Fewer school days also mean lower heating and cooling costs and a smaller payroll for hourly workers.

Cheylin, Wallace County’s Weskan, Cowley County’s Dexter and Burden’s Central district are the four Kansas districts with four-day weeks. The Ashland School Board voted in March to start the shortened week this fall.

For Weskan, a district with about 130 students, the schedule reduces costs for utilities, food service and transportation by about 20 percent.

Students being home on Fridays also is a benefit for the farming community, said high school science teacher Dave Hale.

Weskan went to the shortened week about five years ago, and Hale said the amount of instruction that fit into one school year had not changed.

“We’re pretty consistent with where we’re getting through the textbook,” said Hale, who has taught in the district for 18 years.