Persuasive Essay On Start Time

It is a well known fact that teenagers in general need more sleep. According to the National Sleep Foundation: “[teenage sleep] is as important as the air you breathe, the water you drink and the food you eat. It can even help you to eat better and manage stress of being a teen.” When schools start as early as 7 o’clock, it puts students health at risk. Adolescents already have a natural shift in their internal body clock, or circadian rhythm when it comes to sleep. Puberty allows this to happen, causing a “sleep phase delay” of about two hours. When teens can't fall asleep until late and school starts so early, they aren't getting nearly enough sleep. Lack of such, according to CDC, makes the individual

As a result of a changing body and mind, adolescent sleep cycles have different needs than those of adults or younger children. As a matter of fact, Biologically, sleep patterns shift toward later times for both sleeping and waking during adolescence -- meaning it is natural to not be able to fall asleep before 11:00 pm (“Teens”). In addition to biological change in sleep patterns, teenagers also tend to have eccentric sleep cycles. Obtaining less than healthy hours of sleep during the school week and then catching up on their sleep on the weekends. Most teenagers during the school week, do not get the suggested amount of sleep. In fact, according to a recent poll conducted by the National Sleep Foundation, 80% of teenagers do not get the suggested amount of sleep of 9 hours on school nights (“School Start”). With changing bodies and minds, along with an increased amount of schoolwork and extracurricular activities, teenagers need more sleep than children of a younger age. Experts believe that moving back the start time of school for high school students will improve grades, test scores, and the overall health and personality of many students.

One of the biggest struggles for students today, is the struggle to wake up for school in the mornings, and to make it to class on time. Because of the start times that many high and middle schools currently have, students are having to get up early to get ready, therefore providing them with little sleep at night. They are faced with their everyday schedules, things that are happening in other parts of their lives, as well as having to keep up with their schoolwork. All of this results in a loss of sleep, with the added factor of having to wake up early in the mornings. Having a later start time for schools is beneficial for student’s health, safety, and their overall performance in school.

It has been studied that teenagers need 8.5 to 9.25 hours of sleep every night.But two thirds of teenagers presumably in high school receive only or less than seven hours of sleep.This is probably due to the fact that forty three percent of high schools that are public start before 8:00

Once these students do everything they need to do for the day it usually is around ten thirty at night and by going to bed that late and then waking up so early they only receive around seven hours a sleep a night. Even though extracurricular activities may get in the way of scheduling, one should support later school start times because teens would not be sleep deprived, melatonin levels can balance, and teens will have higher concentration levels throughout the day.

Many high school students wander into school each day shuffling around and trying not to pass out in their classes. In order to cut back on sleep-deprived teens, we must follow through with this solution; it would give students enough time to go to bed early and wake up at an appropriate time. According to Sleep Foundation, teenagers require eight to ten hours of sleep and are not getting that with the current schedule. Many teenagers have discombobulated biological clocks and need the opportunity to adjust their sleeping schedule as they see fit. If this plan were to be put into practice, more positive attitudes would emerge from schools all over America due to their fulfilled need of sleep, which would give teachers, students, principals, counselors, and even parents a more productive start to each day. On the other hand, I realize that the opposing side of this intelligent solution may proclaim that some teenagers would abuse this and go to bed even later, but people must also realize that a large amount of teenagers who wish to succeed academically would gladly not abuse this and respect this privilege; although there would be some teenagers to mistreat this, it is up to the maturity level of the student, and they choose whether they want to succeed or

With early school start times, students tend not to have enough sleep. National Sleep Foundation and American Academy of Pediatrics recommend an eight to ten-hour sleep, which is sufficient. However, 69 percent of the students in the United States sleep less than eight hours per night, which is insufficient. It affects students negatively through health, behaviors, and grades. The lack of sleep promotes students to become sleepy, defenseless, and lead to the inability to concentrate, which may cause injuries and lack of knowledge in school. This dilemma has been around for years and years in the United States. Schools should start later to avoid this dilemma because it provides students with more time to sleep and an efficient work-and-rest

The biological sleep clock of an adolescent tends to be set for later hours than that of a fully grown adult. Which schools seems to ignore due to the fact that it has always been the norm to start school early. A student may focus on school and sacrifice sleep and that causes an number of illnesses (i.e Depression, Narcolepsy, Insomnia, etc…) which would gradually affect the student’s well being and diminishes their ability to do their best in school. Sleep is a necessity and is needed to fully function. One reason that school should start later is that Teenagers have a biological sleeping pattern that shifts more toward later times; therefore, an average teenager needs about 8-10 hours of sleep.

The time in which teenagers wake up to go to school affects their natural sleep cycle. Most teenagers’ sleep cycles start about 11 p.m. and end around 8 a.m. Since school starts early in the morning and most students get up even earlier to catch the bus, teens only sleep 6 or 7 hours instead of the recommended minimum of 8 hours (startschoollater.net). When teens do not have enough rest, they tend to fall asleep easier and

Students all over the United States complain about the start times of the school day. Due to the school start times, students are often unable to receive the amount of sleep recommended by their teachers, as well as being unable to complete everyday activities from lack of energy. It has been proven that delaying school start times causes an increase in students academic performance because it allows students to sleep for longer periods, improve their moods and behavior, and fully apply themselves more in their everyday tasks and functioning.

“It’s 6:00 a.m., the alarm blares loudly in my ear, I struggle to open my eyes and drag myself out of bed, I finally wake up, get ready, arrive at school, and before I know it, I am asleep in first period.” “Two out of three U.S. high school students sleep less than 8 hours on school nights (Yeager).” According to Dr. Robert, an associate professor of internal medicine in the Division of Sleep Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School teens need at least nine hours of sleep. Getting a sufficient amount of sleep is crucial to be healthy and to function properly (Holohan). When teenagers reach a certain age, their bodies sleep cycles start to shift. Teenagers naturally want to fall asleep later and wake up later because of their bodies “inner clocks (Yeager).” Schools should start later in the morning because it can improve student’s academic performance, reduce teen car crash rates, and helps prevent emotional disorders.

Do you think school starts too early? Well, according to recent studies, you’re right! There is lots of data that shows that teenagers aren’t getting enough sleep at night. In fact, according to data from The National Sleep Foundation says 87% of high schoolers don't the recommended amount for someone their age. With lack of sleep comes many negative consequences. If they don’t get enough sleep it can result in health problems, have negative effects on academic performance and increase reliance on drugs, alcohol, and caffeine. Let’s review the problems with schools starting later, the negative effects that sleep loss has on teens, the benefits of getting enough sleep and the setbacks of later start times for schools.

On average high schoolers get about seven to nine hours of sleep,and then have to be up and get to school by seven. But students are never awake or ready to learn, which is why most students are failing their first period. “ Ideally, teenagers faced with early school start times would just go to bed early. However, a voluminous body of research demonstrates that earlier school start times lead teenagers to sleep less. In a recent study in Minnesota, students in schools where classes started at

To begin, school starting as early as it is, teens don’t get enough sleep. Not getting enough sleep is affecting the body negatively. Teens usually get six to seven hours of sleep but Dr. Cora Breuner says, “ We truly believe that our teenagers are getting six to seven hours of sleep a night, and they need eight to 10 (Shute).” Sleep deficit is what most teenagers face. Teens try to redress this by consuming caffeine. Caffeinating to get through the day or trying to sleep more on weekends cannot fix this problem (Shute). In fact it makes it worse.

A study at the University of Minnesota’s Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement showed that adolescents “internal clocks” or hormones that control the sleep schedule are released at different times of the day than those of other age groups. Thus, it is more difficult for a teen to go to bed early in the evening than an adult. In a study, Mary Carskadon, Brown University researcher, studied adolescent sleeping habits and found that 10th-graders who were making the switch to a 7:20 a.m. start time, about an hour earlier than their schedule as ninth-graders. Despite their new schedule, the students went to bed at about the same time as they did the year before: 10:40 p.m. on average. This results in only 5-6 hours of sleep (depending on the time it takes for the student to get ready and travel times), as opposed to the recommend 8.5-9.5. This lack of sleep can cause a decrease in average grades, higher rates of obesity, depression, motor-vehicle accidents among teens and an overall lower quality of life. This depicts the need for high schools to start later in the