. >> reporter: susan s. clark is school superintendent in rural beach cow peach county, georgia. july, public schools in georgia got some bad news. as the state grappled with a budget crisis, they were told to cut spending. peach county suddenly had a shortfall of nearly $800,000. >> do i want to shut the buildings down and take the bulk of my savings and energy and transportation, or do i want to lay off 39 people. >> reporter: so peach county decided to try something new to georgia. a four day school week. for all 4,000 students in peach county, no school on monday. it's saving a similar amount with a three-day furlough for all staff. >> when they first said we were going to a four day week, i thought this is crazy. >> reporter: nancy harper whose daughter is a third grader wasn't happy. >> i planned out what i was going to do. when you make a budget and you've got your finances in a budget and you've got it fixed, all of a sudden they threw a monkey wrench in it. >> reporter: parents are now left trying to keep their kids occupied or cared for on mondays. some got lucky. thank

. >> reporter: susan s. clarkeent in rural peach county, georgia. >> it was almost like, come on! it's a week before school starts. what are we going to do? >> reporter: in july, public schools in georgia got some bad news. as the state grappled with the budget crisis, they were told to cut spending. peach county suddenly ha lly ha shortfall of nearly $800,000. >> do i want to shut the buildings down and take the bulk of the energies in transportation or lay off 39 people. >> reporter: peach county decided to try something new to georgia, a four-day school week. for all 4,000 students in peach county, no school on mondays. the county estimates it will save $400,000 by closing school buildings and parking school buses. it's saving a system lar amount with a three-day furlough for all staff. >> when they first said we were going to a four-day week i thought this is crazy. >> reporter: nancy harper, whose daughter is a third grader at byron elementary, wasn't happy. >> had it planned out what i was going to do, okay,

you know, anything that is age appropriate exercises. >> susan clark says there are no easy options.lieves she took the least damaging course. >> are you willing to take the risk to do what you believe is in the best interest of the children or not? >> there may be more tough choices ahead. the county expects further budget cuts in january. fetd reek ka whitfield, cnn, atlanta. >> here are some of the stories that we are working on. president obama's back to school pep talk has concerns for parents and students who feel and fear that le push his agenda on impressionable young minds. the white house will release that speech at any moment. in kabul, we sit down for the next hour of cnn. my name is chef michael. and my dog bainíy and i love to hang out in the kitchen... so she can watch me cook. you just love the aromas of beef tenderloin... and, ooh, rotisserie chicken. yes, you do. [ barks ] yeah. you're so special, you deserve a very special dog food. [ woman ] introducing chef michael's canine creations. the deliciously different way to serve up your love at mealtime. chef-inspired.

. >> reporter: susan s. clarks school superintendent in rural peach county, georgia. >> it was almost like come on, it's a week before school starts, what are we going to do? >> reporter: in july public schools in georgia got some bad news as the state grappled with crisis, they were told to cut spending. peach county had a shortfall of $800,000. >> do i want to shut the building down and take the bulk of my savings in energy and transportation or do i want to lay off 39 people? >> reporter: so peach county decided to try something new to georgia, a four-day school week. for all 4,000 students in peach county, no school on mondays. the county estimates it will save $400,000 by closing school buildings and parking school buses. it's saving a similar amount with a three-day furlough for all staff. >> when they first said we were going to a four-day week, i thought this is crazy. >> reporter: nancy harp, whose daughter is a third grader at buy ron elementary, wasn't happy. >> planned out what i was going to do, okay?

susan hendricks is there. she watched it with them. these are the kids at the ron clark academy. elle, as you know. i have to say the speech, as you know, was very captivating, no matter what side you were on in terms of the political undertones, if you thought there were any at all. it was very captivating and the kids here really made sure of that in terms of their comments to ron clark, who's teaching behind me and was nice enough to let me do this. here's some of the things they said -- if you mess up, keep trying. president obama was saying, it's okay no mat ter obstacles, keep striving, you're responsible for yourself. i want to introduce you to an eighth-grader, this is travis. travis, thanks for talking to me again. what did you think of obama and what he said to students your age? >> i think it was a great speech. i loved it. he really related to the kids' situations and i liked his thoughts on failure and how if you fail, keep trying and if you try hard enough, you can succeed at anything. >> and do you have any idea, although you're only in eight grade, of what you may

susan wrath, what can you tell me about lab technician raymond clark being taken into custody and given dna samples? >> reporter: nancy, we heard yesterday probably around 9:00 that a search warrant had been obtained. they went into this apartment. first they took him out, as you mentioned, in handcuffs. then they won't into this apartment and began search for evidence. we were told, actually, when he left his apartment on ferry street in middletown, he was actually taken to the state crime lab. it was not open, and a team of scientists were taking all types of samples, blood, we're told, hair, fingernails and that's exactly what they did last night. >> to paul bass, editor with the new haven independent joining us also at the police station. paul bass, thank you for being with us, along with you, susan wrath. paul, a lot of questions. i've asked them, myself, about why dna is taking so long to be returned and now i'm starting to think that, first of all, we know police had staked out clark's place for a couple of days now. their presence has been very obvious. i'm wondering if they wer

police say they should know by the end of this week whether or not clark will be arrested or be cleared. >> straight back out to susan wrath of wsfb. correct me if i'm wrong, but hasn't there been 250 pieces of evidence seized by police? >> you're exactly right. at first it was about 150 and today they released about 250 pieces of evidence. they say they collected a lot of that at the scene of the crime. but a lot of that comes from his apartment. they have interviewed over 100 people. one of the things that came out of the press conference today and while clark is certainly not being called a suspect at this time, he is also a person of interest, and right now they say they have no other person who's a person of interest. i think that was very clear at today's press conference, he's not a suspect, they have interviewed lots of people but he is the only person they are focusing on in this investigation. >> susan, what can you tell me about the manner in which he was taken in for the dna samples? what happened? >> well, when they took him into custody with his handcuffs and it's very unusual as we should point out wit

susan. yeah, fast-moving developments. raymond clarkg up dna samples, and early in the morning police had taken him into custody. as you said, has been now arraigned. police say that this arrest warrant has been sealed, and because of that, they did not speak about the motive. they wouldn't answer many questions. but they did say what led them to this arrest today was forensic evidence, camera surveillance, and interviews with other people. raymond clark was a lab technician here at yale university. his job was to take care of laboratory mice. and his job was also focused in the basement of that lab building, where annie le's body was found on sunday, and her body was found hidden behind a wall. now, what yale has said is that this suspect was a -- an employee at yale since 2004. they say his supervisor did not see any red flags in his employment history here at yale to indicate anything on the measure of this. obviously, yale today in a shock and sadness, but also the president of yale said there is some relief about the progress of th

susan? >> reporter: well, what's new in this case is that he's still not considered a suspect, raymond clark, but at this point, he is the person of interest, in fact, he's the only person of interest. they had a press conference here today. they talked about going over 250 pieces of evidence, which were not only collected at the crime scene, but also at raymond clark's house. they also tell us they've interviewed more than 150 people, but at this point, they say the focus of their investigation is on raymond clark, because they tell us, while they have talked to other people, he is definitely their person of interest. >> why did they release him? >> reporter: what is is that? i'm sorry? >> larry: why did they release him? >> reporter: they released him because, at this point, he is not considered a suspect. he's not been charged with anything. so, officially, they really can hold him. although they don't want to just simply let him go. he was released at about 3:00 this morning from the state crime lab. they took him there in the middle of the night, opened the state crime lab, did all sort