Right now, school starts at 8:05 a.m. and ends at 4:03 p.m.. The early start causes students to wake up anywhere from 5:00 a.m. – 7:30 a.m., some even earlier if there is a zero-hour class or morning sports. The early morning, along with late nights of homework, affects how students function throughout the day. Students and adults alike have discussed the possibility and benefits of starting school at around 9:30 a.m.
The start time of school needs to change.
High schoolers should sleep 8-10 hours a night, but most students take part in extracurriculars, have jobs, or just have busy lives outside of school, causing them to lose a significant amount of sleeping time. On top of that, students still have to deal with homework and studying. At least half the student population participates in extracurriculars. Some extracurriculars take place before or after school. For example, in the fall, the school marching band practices in the morning. They have to arrive on the field at 7 a.m., resulting in many waking up in the 4:30 a.m. – 6 a.m. time frame. The late to bed and early to rise cycle has a detrimental effect on students’ academic performances.
The lack of time students spend sleeping affects the way they learn throughout the day. Students focus less on their work, and learning while tired causes stress about falling behind and grades dropping. This lack of sleep and increase in stress leaves room for distractions, like phones, which give students an easy and quick dopamine boost.
The motivation students receive from a dopamine boost does not give them the right kind of motivation to pay much attention in class. They resort to looking for more dopamine boosts from their phones which creates a cycle that does not involve learning anything from class. In return, phones become a problem, still with nothing in place to help students with lack of sleep. With phones out of the picture, students resort to sleeping during class, creating another issue of students missing time to learn in class.
Starting late at school has flaws, though, as any work-in-progress idea would. If students started at 10 in the morning, school would end closer to 6 in the evening, which would be convenient for those students in extracurriculars. Their after-school activities would last even longer, resulting in them getting home even later. If after-school activities shift to the morning and on different days to avoid scheduling conflicts, students who participate in multiple extracurriculars would not have issues with trying to figure out how to work it into their morning, even though the responsibility of job hours would fall on the student to figure it out. Meanwhile, clubs could meet before school, during lunch or still choose to meet after school if they wanted.
With a bit of rescheduling, a later start for the school day could work. Students could get the rest they need and learn as well as they should. Students could start at a normal time and still get a good education without the need for sleep causing any issues. Moving after-school activities like sports and marching band to the morning would work better so that school can run for the necessary amount of time. After presenting alternative solutions, there is no valid reason not to start school at a later time.
