Picture this - your alarm goes off at 6:30 in the morning. That's it. That's the story. Scary, right? You wouldn't think so, but this is a situation that is all-too-common for students in middle and high school, and that simple fact is terrifying. The culprit? School start times. Students just aren't getting the 8-9 hours of sleep they need, and this is affecting them in negative ways. School start times in the U.S. should be 8:30 or later for all middle and high schools.
Adolescents have a delayed sleep cycle compared to adults. “Their natural body clocks can keep adolescents awake until 11 PM or later, in spite of going to bed earlier and good sleep hygiene, such as avoiding stimulating activity at night and minimizing caffeine intake in the afternoon or evening.”(“School Start Times” par. 9) The average school start time in the US is 8:03 AM(“Middle School and High School Students” par. 1), so if we round that to 8AM, then yes, students do get 9 hours of sleep. However, this is not accounting for the fact that students do not fall asleep at exactly 11 PM and usually do so later than that, and students actually wake up for school up to an hour before it actually starts. Less than a third of high schoolers report getting at least 8 hours of sleep on school nights(“School Start Times” par. 1).
Of course delaying start times can cause problems, most notably the schedules for extracurricular activities and sports. However, schools should value the education of their students more than anything else, and delaying start times would benefit students greatly. Even 8:30 isn't a drastic change, moving activities outside of school by an hour at most will still have the pros outweigh the cons.
Sleep is actually a huge factor in students. “Insufficient sleep in children and adolescents has been shown to be associated with a wide variety of adverse outcomes in multiple aspects of their lives from poor mental and physical health to behavioral problems and poor academic grades.”(“School Start Times” par. 1) The benefits of shifting school start times also has some other huge benefits. In a county in Kentucky following a 1 hour delay in school start times, there was a whopping 16.5% decrease in motor vehicle crashes for 17 and 18-year-olds. The rest of the state saw a 7.8% increase in crashes for that age group. (“School Start Times” par. 25) So not only would delaying school start times benefit a student's mental health, physical health and even their grades, it could even help to mitigate student car crashes! And that's not even the end of it. “Students who don't get enough sleep are more likely to engage in unhealthy risk behaviors such as drinking, smoking tobacco, and using illicit drugs.”(CDC par. 4) Just a small offset of an hour can do so much for students, yet less than 20% of all schools in the U.S. start at 8:30 or later.
This information isn't new either. It's been around since the late 1980's(“School Start Times” par. 5), which means that this information has been around for at least 3 decades. You would think that would be enough for at least most school districts to make the change to a much more logical school time, but this is not the case. According to a survey of 345 public high school personnel, most of them hadn't even considered changing their start times(AAP par. 15). This is astounding considering the benefits of that extra sleep in the morning, including a better attendance and better grades overall.
Studies conducted have shown that a later start time can correlate to less problems focusing in class, as well as an easier time paying attention(“School Start Times” par. 21). Another study has shown that an earlier start time relates to more tardiness and absences. Academic performance improved for those students as well(“School Start Times” par. 23). Some argue that a later start time for schools would result in students simply going to sleep later. However, this would not be the case. “In a study of adolescents attending an independent school that instituted a start time delay of 30 minutes (from 8:00 to 8:30 am), reported that average bedtimes actually shifted earlier by an average of 18 minutes, and mean self-reported school night sleep duration increased by 45 minutes.”(AAP par. 8) In addition to longer reported sleep durations, students with later start times were also less likely to report daytime sleepiness and falling asleep in class(“School Start Times” par. 17). Caffeine use is also popular among students to lessen feelings of sleepiness, and one study found that after a 25 minute delay in school start times, caffeine usage had an overall decrease(“School Start Times” par. 18).
Although less consistent and less significant, a delay in school start times has been observed to have a positive impact on academic achievement. A Chicago study noted that students performed better in afternoon classes as opposed to first-period classes. In a study targeted for middle school students, shifting the start times by an hour resulted in a 3 percentile point gain for both math and reading for the average student. In another study, 5 out of the 6 high schools that had their GPA assessed saw a significant increase in the GPA of the core subjects of math, english, science and social studies(AAP par. 11).
In conclusion, shifting school start times to 8:30 would benefit students greatly in many positive ways, such as academic achievement and mental health. As well as a decrease in motor vehicle crashes for students, doing so could also potentially reduce the amount of students that engage in unhealthy behaviors such as drinking or using drugs. Although there may be technical complications in shifting school start times, the pros vastly outweigh the cons in this situation. By delaying the start times for schools, absences and tardiness could also decrease, and student caffeine usage could also decrease. Schools should want the best for their students, and by delaying start times, schools are giving their students the tools they need to succeed.