Wildcat Pause Day falls on Friday, Oct. 9, giving students and faculty a day off to focus on their mental, physical and emotional well-being. Introduced in 2024, the day is designed for students but extends to faculty and staff. However, opinions vary on whether one day off is enough and whether this year’s Pause Day is scheduled at the right time.
According to K-State Today, Wildcat Pause Day is part of the university’s “Health and Well-Being Month.” On this day off, many students either go home for the weekend, catch up on schoolwork or truly enjoy a day off from school. Faculty may use this day to catch up on work or rest as well.
Nick Homburg, professor of practice in the A.Q. Miller School of Media and Communication, said Wildcat Pause Day is a day for him to get up to date with his classes and prioritize grading and course development.
“It does give us a day to get caught up on everything,” Homburg said. “It really doesn’t affect me much because even when the students get winter and spring break off, I’m still working.”
Homburg said student and faculty burnout are similar. Wildcat Pause Day is supposed to provide relief to both students and professors, but he said there is no disconnect from work for him on the day off.
“I mean you get to a point where you’ve just done the same thing so often and so much of it and you don’t get five minutes to take a breath,” Homburg said. “It just starts to overwhelm everything you do.”
Homburg said students and faculty need breaks, but one day is not long enough. Intense workloads for long periods of time are demanding, and trying to fit that into the school schedule can be difficult, he said.
“I do think that it needs to be more like a four-day weekend instead of just a random day,” Homburg said. “Because most students … in my experience … use it for the same thing that I do, and that is to get caught up.”
Students have shared their opinions about the break’s length on YikYak, an anonymous social media app, with one student posting, “Hey Willie … can we get a Wildcat pause week?”
Students have also raised many concerns on the app about Pause Day’s timing due to it being the day before a Saturday home football game.
Another student posted that K-State should have “a fall break like every other college,” a sentiment Hannah Muzik, junior studying strategic management, echoed. She said Pause Day is a much-needed break for K-State students before they go to school from Labor Day to the end of November, but she wishes the university provided more.
“My friends that are in other colleges, they all have like two or three days for fall break,” Muzik said. “I wish there were more of them … I really like that we have one in the fall.”
Muzik said she thinks it depends on how students use the day, and she plans to use it to catch up on classwork.
“I feel like it is kind of just what you make of it,” Muzik said.
