Pros And Cons Of Later School Start Times

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

The school day should start later in order improve students’ mental health. Survey results have consistently indicated that middle level and high school students who start school at 7:15 a.m. or earlier obtain less total sleep on school nights due to earlier rise times in comparison to students at later-starting schools. () This is just the beginning of the negative impacts that early start times have on students. By starting school at a later time, students’ brains will function better, their grades and learning increases, and will be more mentally stable.

Some people may ask, “Why don’t teenagers just go to bed earlier, instead of having school later?” This is a common concern for parents and teachers as well. The fact is, adolescents have different sleeping patterns than adults do. Throughout the day, teenagers are most tired during the morning, and most alert at night (Cerve 4). “The body’s internal clock shifts after puberty, making it

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.

This article by the National Sleep Foundation describes how adolescents today are not getting the recommended amount of sleep and in return do not perform appropriately or at their maximum level at school. Through different scientific studies it was discovered that adolescent NATURALLY fall asleep at 11 P.M. or later. One study looked at the melatonin secretion in patients and how it occurred later at night in adolescents. Through research the National Sleep Foundation has urged schools to synchronize school clock with student body clocks (If teens naturally fall asleep at 11 P.M. and require 9.5 hours of sleep, school should start approximately at 9:00-10:00 A.M., 1 to 3 hours after current SC school start times). This sources supports my claim to start school later and provides support research about the negative aspects of sleep deprivation in adolescents and the importance of reforming school start times

School start times play a very big role in a student’s overall development, especially when they aren’t getting enough sleep because of it. An important factor to consider for a student’s development is the act of sleeping; that a lack of it can cause serious problems to the students’ growing body. According to research done with Brown University’s Julie Boergers, the author of the letter “Benefits of later school start times”, the amount of sleep that adolescents need ranges from 8.5 to 9.5 hours of sleep. Only 17 percent of these students

Typically, people enjoy receiving an extra hour of sleep, even an extra five minutes of sleep. Teens are just one group of people who enjoy sleep. Unfortunately, teens are unable to obtain the correct number of hours per night. Later school start times would be beneficial because the schools would see an impact on attendance, increased school performance, and based on several studies, students would receive the recommended amount of sleep. The psychological effects would greatly outweigh the negative effects caused by an early start time. Benefits of a later start time include, better health, improved grades and teens reaching the recommended amount of sleep per night. Downfalls of starting school later would be transportation issues, coddling

The primary reason for attending school is for adolescents to get an education in hopes of getting a good job.  Attendance, test scores, and GPA’s all play an important role in a student’s success in school, and if they can all be improved by pushing the start time back, then this issue should be pushed further.  The root problem of students not performing to their full potential has to do with the inability to focus from drowsiness in class due to the lack of sleep they are getting.  To support this point, Carskadon, a professor of psychiatry and human behavior, and his team, “found that students showed up for morning classes seriously sleep-deprived and that the 7:20 a.m. start time required them to be awake during hours that ran contrary to their internal clocks” (Richmond).  In other words, Carskadon believes that current high school start times go against teens’ natural sleep patterns, making them be awake at a time where their bodies aren’t ready to get up yet.  This causes concentration issues making paying attention in class harder, and kids not getting the best grades they can.  Also, sleep won’t get any

Have you ever been really tired when you wake up for school in the morning? Sleep is very important to all teens, or it should be. Young adults should have 8.5-9.25 hours of sleep every night, according to the National Sleep Foundation (NSF), in Sarah McKibben’s article “Wake Up Calls”. Unfortunately, two-thirds of teens are getting less than 7 hours of sleep each night, according to the NSF’s chart. This is causing a large number of schools and scientists to think that schools should start later in the morning. I fiercely disagree with this. Schools should not start later because starting later for high schools would cause too many negative consequences.

There may be some of you out there who simply believe, “Why don’t they just go to sleep earlier?” The truth is, that the biological clock in adolescents can change on average two hours from middle school into high school, which means that they are supposed to go to sleep at 11 and wake up at around 8 (“Teens Need”). This time frame is not taken into account in high school start times, which suggest adolescents going to sleep at 9 and waking up at 6. The time suggested by the schools goes against a high schooler 's biological clock, leaving most teens going to sleep around 11 and waking up at an average time of 5:30; a mere 6 ½ hours of sleep is achieved with this time frame, 3 hours less than what has been recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics (Maloney-Dunn). The American Academy of Pediatrics suggest a high school start time of 8:30 or later

Schools should start later because students need more time to rest in the morning. Some reasons also show that it will mess up schedules. With more rest comes more energy and with more energy comes better grades. Studies have shown that schools that start later often have better performing students.

Starting school at later times makes students more likely to pay attention in class. The California Academy of Sciences says, ¨Studies have shown that middle and high school students with adequate amounts of sleep, 8-10 hours, have better test scores. ¨ Since students do not get enough sleep, it would be very beneficial to start school at later times, since they would fall asleep with the correct amount of sleep. To add on to this reason, Diana Zuckerman Ph.D. says, ¨In order to compensate for the later start time, the school cut 5-10 minutes of every class and activity. The change meant students had slightly less time in the classroom, but the tradeoff was improved attention during the school day.¨ Although starting classes at later times

School is not the most desirable place that a teenager would want to be at seven hours a day, five days a week, 180 days a year, and even more problematic is that for them to get to school on time, they have to fight their biological clocks (Hansen). Many schools have started pushing their start times back by even just an hour, and helped with the students grades and mental health by giving them the time they need to sleep (“4 Good Snooze”). Pushing start times back a good idea because it will give students the rest they need to be successful.

Research shows that teens sleep cycles are naturally delayed (Should High School Start Later, 2013). About fifteen percent of high schools start at 8:30am or later and, forty percent of schools start earlier than 8:00 am (SiOWfa, 2014). The start times of schools are reducing the amount of sleep a student is receiving on school nights. Most teens start their day at 5:30-6:30 am to prepare for school, but if their natural bedtime is 11 pm or even midnight, they are getting only 6-7 hours of sleep! Remember that teens need at least 8 hours to function properly. To fix this issue schools will have to start later.

A big reason school’s may enjoy having a later start time, is because it can contribute to the school’s success. A later start time can improve the school’s overall test scores (Why We Must - and Can - Restore Safe & Healthy School Hours). Students can learn their best when they are not tired or drowsy. The School Start Later — Healthy Hours campaign stated that, “Academic improvements have been shown, and overall school climate has been measurably improved when high schools have restored later start times,” (Why We Must - and Can - Restore Safe & Healthy School Hours). The sleep researcher mentioned earlier, Wendy Troxel, said in her presentation that when kid’s are woken up by an alarm, they are literally robbed of their dreams. Dreams are associated with learning development. In order for student’s to use the most of their brains, they need to be receiving the right amount of good quality sleep. Not only do test scores rise, but so does the graduation rate, which is a major problem in today’s generation (Why We Must - and Can - Restore Safe & Healthy School Hours). In contribution to the student success, later start times could drastically improve the school’s success. Later start times have increased attendance around