This is an awesome story.  Many parents wouldn’t encourage their kids to visit a local fast food joint to complete homework assignments, but for those kids who work, McDonald’s and some other franchise owners are giving school age kids extra time on the clock if they use the time to study.  This shows real dedication to education, and personally gives me some hope that our nation has not devalued school to a disastrous level.  According to this Associated Press article, “In a 2000 study by the Families and Work Institute, 38 percent of students employed during the school year said that working harmed their school performance.” This is a significant number when you consider that 25% of high school freshmen and 75% of high school seniors balance work and school. 

It seems that if a child is struggling to manage schoolwork, then their work schedule should be cut back or eliminated until they are ready to resume and handle it, but for those kids who really need to work, I applaud the McDonald’s franchisees for pitching in to help.

Kudos to CNN and the Associated Press for this story.  Highschoolers have multiple pressures these days with college becoming increasingly competitive and GPAs soaring through the ceiling.  Still, some kids need to work, or would like the experience, and with all the corporate greed, it is nice to see that businesses value education enough to chip in and help children finish high school.  The message they send is much more powerful for working kids than most anything a parent could say about finishing homework.  When your first employer pays you to study, it is the strongest endorsement a child could receive.  Hopefully more companies who employ high school students will follow in their footsteps