Why Schools Should Start Later

Do you ever wake up and feel like you haven’t gotten enough sleep? The reason is because in reality you probably haven’t. Studies show that schools should not start any earlier that 8:30 in the morning due to teens suffering from sleep deprivation. There are many negative effects this condition can have on a teens body including a direct effect on one’s physical and mental health, public safety and excelling in the future. In the Ted Talk video, " Why school should start later for teens" by, Wendy Troxel.  Ms. Troxel explained why school should start later for teens.. Students are very drowsy in the morning and are usually rushing to get to school on time which limits breakfasts times and healthy food options. Schools should start no earlier than 8:30 a.m.  for several reasons  but sleep deprivation is  the most important. Sleep deprivation can cause a direct effect to a child’s general health and behavior, public safety and potentially future success.

Teenagers need more sleep. If schools start school later, students would be less tired. A study of eight schools in Minnesota started school 1 hour later and grades and morale went up and tardiness went down. It has been scientifically proven in a test they did in Minnesota that 8 schools stated later and most of the students grades went up they were happier and everyone seemed more

Early school start times prevent many students and teachers from getting a full nine hours of sleep per night. Some people say that waking up early will help prepare them for later in life; however, this is actually hurting them because of the likelihood of depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and many other impacts to students health. Schools should begin later in the morning because it will improve grades, student-athletes that participate in school , and the overall health of the students and teachers.​ Starting school later in the day will increase the overall health and productivity of a student. Students could develop serious mental health issues and diseases which would ruin them and those around them. The following excerpt is from the book The Promise of Sleep written by William Dement and

“Making teens start school in the morning is cruel” says brain doctor. Mary Carskadon at Brown University has shown that teenagers need about nine hours a night to maintain full alertness and academic performance. Getting up at 6:00 am is totoo early. We should have a later start time because we need more sleep to focus, tTeens need a certain amount of sleep, and we need to stop dozing off in class.

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.

Whenever the alarm goes off almost everyone wants to hit the snooze button. Kids are not getting enough sleep, but is starting school later the solution? Starting school later would mean transportation issues and school would get out later. Also, extra curricular activities for some kids end as late as nine o’clock now so pushing the start time back would cause kids getting home really late and still not getting enough sleep. Schools should not start any later.

As children’s doctor and sleep expert Daniel Lewin stated, “The call for later school start times is an essential movement for keeping tweens and teens healthy.” Several reasons why school hours are unjust due to early start times include first, students not being able to focus as easily in class. Next, students also cannot participate to their full capability when their mind and body are not rested properly. Also, recent studies have concluded that teenagers cause more automobile accidents on their way to school, due to being sleep deprived. A negative perspective considering a later school start revolves around the idea that through history school hours have consistently ended before a specific time. This seems to support the fact that “after school

There has always been a controversy as to if the school day should start later on in the morning or not. The University of Minnesota study shows that schools who have already changed the beginning of the school day to later have found that only a third of students actually received eight or more hours of sleep while the students who received less than eight hours reported to have more symptoms of depression, higher counts of caffeine, and substance abuse with alcohol and drugs. In “Should the School Day Start Later?” written by Michael Gonchar, Gonchar writes that, “New evidence suggests that a later start to the school day could have all sorts of benefits…” Some of those benefits could include the decrease of tardiness, increase in attendance, test scores and everyday grades, more positive mental health, and even car crash rates. All in all the research and studies over if the school day should start later has been in discussion for years.

School start times should be later because school times should revolve around the student’s best ability to learn. When America started public schools, they had the same time frame, around seven to three. They did this so the farmers would have time to go and work in the afternoon. Well, needless to say we still have the same schedule now, with a much different industry and way of life. There are countless reasons schools should start later and countless studies that prove school should start later. I think some of the more important reasons include, a teen’s biological clock that makes their brain want to go to bed and get up late, car crashes caused by sleep deprivation and more sleep increasing concentration, alertness and a better attitude in class

First, school times should be pushed back to later start times because students will not be sleep deprived. Many teenagers are not getting enough sleep and this is due to early school start times. A National Sleep Foundation Poll reported 28% of teenagers fall asleep at least once a week during first hour of school due to their lack of sleep. This means that

School shouldn't start later, why? Because kids should be able to get up for school and should be able to go to bed early. School must not start later. It is kind've important because if school starts later it can mess up your parents work schedule.

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.

School start times vary across the country, from six to ten o’clock in the morning, and are heavily debated by students, parents, and superintendents. Some believe that the early bird gets the worm, while others demand their beauty sleep. I firmly believe that all schools should start later in the day, since it helps students get more sleep, perform better in school, and be more alert in class.

Almost every day high school students are waking up around six o’clock in the morning to get ready for school, some even earlier than that. Nearly every morning students are waking up without adequate sleep. If sleep is one of the most essential needs of the body in order to grow and develop, shouldn’t we be more aware of how much it affects students everyday performance? The ways in which students are affected by sleep-deprivation is precisely why school needs to start later.

One of the reasons that school should be started later is because it does not give growing teens enough time to sleep. Sleep researcher, Wendy Troxel, who spoke on TED, says that high school aged kids’ sleep cycles do no start until 11 p.m and do not end until 8 a.m. This means that whenever students’ alarms go off from anywhere around 5-7:30 a.m, it simply does not