<p>Local HS starts at 7:20–bus pick-up often before 7:00.
Younger child had 2 semesters of dual-enrolling, which meant she did not have to be at HS until 9:00. With the later start-time, she was more cheerful and less stressed.</p>
<p>Many years ago, I did some reasearch on the subject and presented it ot our School Board. They didn’t listen. Just kept doing things the same old way. What I found was that the pediatric medical assn in Minnesota (in a town that starts with an E) requested that the School Board change start times for HS students because overall, a teen-agers’ internal clock does not allow him/her to go to sleep early. They said there were many sleep-deprived illneses/conditions that they were seeing. All kinds of arguments were brought up. It would be dangerous for the small kids to be out waiting for a bus in the dark. Turned out - no real concern - every bus stop always has at least one parent there with the little kids. And what about working? Minn has a law that a student cannot work more than 4 hours per day in order to be able to study and do homework. This wasn’t a problem, as long as they could get to work by 4 and work until 8. And if they have to drive more than 15-20 minutes, they shouldn’t be working that far, anyway. Results from the experiment were extrememly positive - test scores improved and disciplinary problems went down including in kids with ADD and ADHD. All in all, a great idea to start HS later.</p>
<p>School starts at 7:30 am for me out in rural-ish OH. Ends at 2:30.</p>
<p>We have eight classes, and this schedule works out pretty well, IMO. We have one “happy ■■■■■” teacher that gripes about this, but if she could learn to actually teach a class, she might not complain so much ;)</p>
<p>Honestly, I wish that we had an opportunity to take a “9th period” class from 2:30-3:15 pm at my school, but this is a pipe dream…</p>
<p>
Yes, the town was Edina (and the same thing was done in Minneapolis) and the outcomes were all positive. Academics, health, and behavior all improved. Clearly it’s possible to do, yet the rest of the country continues to ignore the results.</p>
<p>The day starts at 5:55am at our house, out the door to the high school at 6:30. Arrive for first bell by 6:50, second bell starts the day at 7:00am. School is out at 3:00pm, unless there is music or theatre, then it is a 5:00pm pick up. Time enough for dinner and a little homework, then back to the school for show rehearsals until 9:00pm. Keeping in mind that my S is an honors student at an Arts school, this to me is still a crazy load. This doesn’t even take into account that he has more homework to take care of when he gets home after 9:00pm rehearsals. The life of a triple threat student is a sacrafice I know, but please.</p>
<p>Our high school’s first class is at 7:40, and so it’s OK. However, our bus arrives extremely early (about 6:55) and it’s only a 10 minute ride to our school. I think it would help a LOT if our buses simply came at 7:20, only problem is the rest of the buses usually come at that time too so I guess it isn’t plausible. But asking high schoolers who usually have to go to sleep at 12 or 1 because of the immense workload to sleep less than middle schoolers who get to sleep at 10 is a bit unfair, but I still see the other side of the argument.</p>
<p>I’m surprised to hear of all these schools starting so early. My school does and always has started at 8:35, which seems to be a pretty reasonable time. It must be a regional thing because most of my friends’ schools start at a similar time. This year I have first period free every day, so I don’t have to be in school until 9:30 every morning (I take public transportation). Being able to sleep later has made a marked difference in my day to day life. I don’t have to drink as much coffee, and I feel more alert and present all day. I can only imagine how much better I would have done in school previous years if I had had the same schedule I do now.</p>
<p>I personally do sports, and I think that it is a little tough for athletes to do sports before school, and shower and all that, but just an hour difference in start time really isnt the much. My school starts at 7:30, and im exhausted every single day. I think it would be good to start school at 8:30, but i think that 9:30 is a bit much</p>
<p>Elementary and high school start times should, in an ideal world, be switched. When I was little, I used to be wide awake at 5:45 am, so I played video games and watched tv for the next two hours before school. Now I have to wake up at 6:15, and it’s rough.</p>
<p>It is a scientifically substantiated fact that when the classes start later, grades go up. Why? The kids are awake! They are growing and their sleep cycle compels them to sleep later.</p>
<p>We need a school system with students rather than teacher’s unions as the priority.</p>
<p>My daughter was a swimmer in high school. She had to be in the pool ready for practice by 5:15 a.m. Meant that she had to be up by 4:45 each day. Also had a second 2 hour practice after school. She carried a full load of advanced classes (IB) and managed to do well despite little sleep. I can only imagine how much better she would have doneboh in swimming and in school if she had gotten more rest. She is a freshman at a LAC this year and is thrilled that she doesn’t have to be anywere before 8:00 a.m. She now wonders how and why she got up so early all those years. I always thought it was ridiculous but could never talk her into quitting the team.</p>
<p>So, it is obvious that more sleep leads to better grades. What is not obvious is whether starting later will cause this.</p>
<p>More sleep can only be a result of getting to bed at the same time, as the wakeup time is pushed an hour later. Is this plausible?</p>
<p>Yes, yes it is.</p>
<p>Because the sun as well as societal standards dictate that 9 o’clock is night, and that if you’re not asleep by 12 o’clock midnight, it’s late. The numbers can vary, but I think it is false to assume that just because school starts later, teenagers will go to bed later. Some will, but most will benefit from the extra hour.</p>
<p>My proposition - for systems that do high school at 7:30ish, middle school an hour later, and elementary school at 9:30 - is to swap the high school and middle school. High school and middle school kids are still home before the elementary kids, though I wish we didn’t have to plot around such a contradictory hindrance.</p>
<p>When I was in middle school, I woke up at about the same time as my brother, a high school student, as I went to a magnet school further away. I’d be up at about 6, and home after 4 (later with an after school activity.) And I managed quite well. My parents had a 9 o’clock bedtime through elementary school, which was mildly enforced through middle school. I was always getting tired by that point and in bed by 10. I got at least 8 hours of sleep every day and I aced my classes, never catching even one extra wink in school.</p>
<p>In high school, I found I could not keep up this schedule. It got to be I’d aim for bed at 10:30, end up there at 11 because of homework. I did not understand, as a sophomore, why one senior said “You get to bed before midnight?! I’m lucky to get 4, 5 hours tops.” I couldn’t imagine that much work. As a senior, I understood. With college apps, and everything else, there’s just no way to get to bed before midnight. I swear, if we pushed school back an hour, it’d be the same way - I’d get to bed around midnight, obtaining an extra hour of sleep. Even so, the earlier years aren’t like middle school. A mixture of requiring more sleep but necessarily obtaining less. There’s much more homework, much more after school troubles, and I’ve found there are just times when I am unproductive. I wish I could just Some of the time wake up after the sun was up (I don’t even get to see the sunrise, as I’m in school before that happens in the winter).</p>
<p>Something needs to change.</p>
<p>Students in high school are teenagers, and that’s when the body is experiencing major growths. You need sleep to help you grow. How are you supposed to do that when you’re being loaded with homework and after school activities, with applications and whatnot for senior year, and expected to achieve high levels of success while <em>optionally</em> maintaining a social life? What do you gain by being in school an hour earlier rather than giving (us) students an hour of sleep that will improve their focus and enthusiasm in their early periods? All teachers who teach in the morning will say without a doubt that along with the last period it’s hardest to teach the first, even second period. Students just can’t function at nearly their best at such early times. The point of school is to get a good education. How are you supposed to do that when you’re only half awake? Again, what harm can it do to just move classes back to maybe an hour earlier?</p>
<p>My school starts at 7:30 and I would love if they could push it back even half an hour. Whatever helps.</p>
<p>I can’t complain too much because I wake up at 7:20 every morning, but a later start time would help ALOT. Regular 1st period starts at 8am for most kids and seniors who have the choice of taking 5 classes can start at 9am (like me) but I have to to commute 25 miles to my high school and I am dead tired in 2nd and 3rd period. I get home at 4pm and almost immediatley have to take a nap. I guess I’m lucky my work load this year is non existant as far as homework goes (see, community college). It’s partially my fault I go to sleep late but the school also requires 5 classe when I onlyn eed 4 to graduate which is annoying. I am dying to leave hs, as a result I have “missed” a day of school almost every week :p</p>
<p>My high school used to start at 8am and get out at 2:30pm. Starting my sophomore year though, they changed the start time to 8:55am and the end time to 3:30pm. They say that it was because of research that said as high school students we need more sleep, but the real reason was because it was going to be a lot cheaper. And for the record, nobody got more sleep…we all just stayed up later!</p>
<p>Making school start later was a NEGATIVE CHANGE!</p>
<p>Reasons:</p>
<p>1) The elementary schools started at 8am and got out at 2pm, so many of the older kids who used to watch their younger siblings no longer could.
2) Many people could no longer hold their jobs because they were required to get there earlier than they could. This happened to me.
3) There used to be an hour between the end of school and the start of sports in which homework and other things could be done, but now they start almost immediately after school.</p>
<p>Those are the biggest reasons, though I’m sure other people have more.</p>
<p>Personally, although I wasn’t a fan of getting up at 7am, I much preferred that schedule to the new one.</p>
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<p>Some teenagers need 10 hours of sleep, but many do not! If I sleep for 10 hours, it means that I’m either sleep deprived or sick. I literally cannot sleep for that long otherwise. Between 7 and 8 hours is perfect for me.</p>
<p>Our high school is much like all of the others, start time at 7:45. We don’t do 0 hours or before school activities. However, we have block days on Wednesday and Thursday. That translates to a late arrival Thursday of 9am. My kids have always loved it as they get to sleep in. Sometimes it means that they stay up that much later too on Wednesday which is counter productive. As a student, the other advantage is that you can make up the test or lab if you missed a day during that time.</p>
<p>It’s difficult to go to bed at an earlier hour when you have to worry about sports, clubs, and volunteering, just so you can get into a decent college. By the time you get home at 5 or 6 and eat dinner, it’s around 7 or 8 before you start on homework which can easily take hours, especially when taking honors and AP classes. This allows for 0 recreation time, so even if a student takes only an hour break, they will still wind up going to bed around 11 at the earliest.</p>
<p>My old school used to start at 7:50 and get out at 2:45.</p>
<p>I’m in high school right now, and my first class of each day starts at 8:00. I think that 8:00 is pretty early, but I know that a lot of other schools start a lot earlier. I have some friends who go to another high school who start school at 7:15 and don’t finish sports practice until 6:30…That’s almost a 12 hour day at school. Then they start homework.</p>
<p>Until Nov. 2, 2011 there’s at least a chance to set a lower limit on the time schools can start. An online petition at the White House’s We the People website- <a href=“http://wh.gov/2qJ[/url]”>http://wh.gov/2qJ</a> - asks for legistlation to prevent public schools from opening before 8 a.m. The idea here isn’t to dictate exact timetables to school systems but to set a basic standard of decency that allows school times compatible with the health, welfare, & learning of all kids (and young teachers, many of whom can’t function any better than teens at 7 a.m.). Hopefully this limit will allow school systems to start younger kids after 7 and middle and high schools even later, given what we know about sleep science. Anyway, please sign the petition if you care about this issue, and spread the word. If the petition gets 5000 signaturs by Nov. 2, 2011 (anyone 13 or over can sign), it’s supposed be be reviewed and responded to by White House officials.</p>
<p>Thanks, earthmother. I just passed along the petition link to the head of our local committee that is working to change school start times. It was a minor pain to register in order to “sign” the petition but, hopefully, well worth it.</p>