Should Schools Have Later Start Time Essay

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

Almost 10% of U.S. high schools start before 7:30 a.m. Over 20% of middle schools start class at 7:45 a.m. or earlier. This is leaving students everywhere overwhelmed and tired. This can lead to tremendous effects on their health and grades. Research shows that only do later start times improve those things, but ends up increasing the school's yearly income in the long run. For these reasons, schools should make their hours later because it can affect students grades and health in a positive way.

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.

Imagine you are looking from the top of a sixth grader's room. It's almost 6:00 A.M. and it's still really dark out. BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! He jumps up suddenly and glares at his alarm clock. It looks like he just wants to punch the thing right off of his nightstand. You hear him say, "Ugh, why do we have to get up so early, can't we have a later school start time?" Adolescents not getting enough sleep has been spreading, but in the year 2000 it has really begun to have an affect. Parents are saying that their child is tired when they get home. Now schools have been trying to solve that problem with later start times. The students at Middle School South Lake Zurich Illinois would like later start times. It won't cost much, it benefits the students and teachers. However, there are some problems. But still, there are lots of benefits.

The article “Later start time for teens improves grades, mood, and safety” addresses the topic for teens to have later start times. “The evidence shows that the later the start time, the greater the academic benefits” (Wahlstrom 2016, pg 2). The author has strong arguments concluding the medical research, schools actually participating in later start times, academic outcomes, and health/activity outcome. School starting times being later could be more effective for students in their health and scholastic purposes.

Having a later school start time can increase a student’s academic grades and awareness. Thirty-three percent of teens say that they fell asleep in class. Even though this is a small portion of teens, falling asleep in class shouldn’t even happen once. Also, this means they are getting less than what they need,(eight to nine hours of sleep a night). A school needs to pack as much teaching time as they can in a day, but if that means waking up a student at a time so early, then there's no point.When a student doesn’t sleep as much, students are not aware as they would be if they had a good night’s rest. If students had this sleep, the would pay more attention in class. Therefor, a student would have better grades.

According to NPR.com, Scientists have proven that past a certain age, regardless of technology being in the bedroom, kids and teens can’t fall asleep until their brain lets them, for some children, that time might be after 10:30pm. Schools should have later start times because later start times positively affect standardized test scores, reduces teenage traffic accidents, and students are proven to have a better overall emotional well being, even though parent schedules may be a problem.. Schools should have later start time for middle school students, for the schools and the students well being.

High school students should have a later starting time in school due to students not getting the amount of sleep they need to function. Students that stay up late at night are way too tired to learn when they get to school early in the morning. Most students who do stay up late are unable to sleep due to melatonin not yet being produced. This shows that starting school at a later time would have many positive benefits. These benefits include higher test scores, increased attendance, more participation from students, and higher performance from athletes.

Going to bed at 2:00 in the morning and waking up at 6:30 AM to go to school is a nightmare for anyone. Unfortunately, this situation is far too common in today’s schools. But have you ever wondered how insufficient sleep affects your everyday life? Schools must start later. With early start times thwarting students’ health and safety, adolescents needing more sleep in general, and teens having trouble sleeping early, later start times are essential.

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.

In the first place, students are not getting enough sleep. In the article “Should School Start later” by Lisa M. Herrington [20] “According to the National Sleep Foundation “59% of 6th-8th graders and 87% of high schoolers aren't getting the sleep they require”. This quote shows that students are not getting the sleep they need. And kids must wake up early how are they getting the sleep we need. “So why don’t kids just go to sleep earlier? It’s not that simple” Says Danny Lewin, a sleep specialist at Children's National Health system in Washington, D.C. “Adolescents have a deeply programmed biological clock to go to bed later and wake later” Says

Changing things could really mess up people's schedules and even cause students to have to say up later. Of course there are plenty of reasons why later start times are beneficial, but I believe that the pros weigh out the cons. Let me show you why. In one instance, the times of many practices and extracurricular activities have been pushed back, even after 9:00!!

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

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 that start before 8 a.m. are a major reason students aren’t getting adequate sleep. According to the National Sleep Foundation teenagers need on average 8 ½ - 9 ½ hours of sleep a night(Schute, Nancy). Realistically students rarely get that much sleep. When students don’t get adequate sleep it has the ability to affect their attention span, memory, problem-solving ability, and mood(Rosenberg, Russell). Are these students actually expected to pay attention, learn, solve problems, and have an acceptable attitude when they wake up sleep deprived? With a sleep cycle that changes once students hit puberty and an increase in the production of melatonin its nearly impossible for teens to fall asleep before 10:30 p.m.(Edwards, Finley). In my own experience I don’t even get tired until around 11:30 p.m. and barely fall asleep before 12, so it makes it extremely difficult to wake up at 6 a.m. and get ready for the day.