Sleepy Teens In High School

administrative and operational pressure. Also it becomes too difficult to schedule sports and extracurricular activators. Another benefit is a late start time will disrupt parents schedules. Also starting school later in the day will affect time available for after school tutoring. The last benefit is students and their families are already conditioned for every bell. These benefits show that begging schools at a later start time could affect people’s schedules and affect school districts.

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.

Research has shown that in schools with a later start time absences and tardies had significantly declined. Also with a later start to school teachers and students would have more time to get ready. Students would not have to wait outside their

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

I do think that changing start times will help boost academic scores and participation. Erde tells us that “communities that have been able to change school start times, they report improvement in academic performance, a decrease in teen depression, a decrease in tardiness and truancy, an increased alertness in class, and a reduction in teen car accidents”. This quote shows the link between adequate

The “schools that have pushed start times to 8 a.m. or later have seen promising results” (O’Neill). Since schools have had good results other schools should do it too. As a result of this “students are more alert and there are fewer incidents of tardiness” (O’Neill). There are even more examples of benefits because of this. A lot of people may say that it will make it for people would have to go to sleep later.

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.

Shorter school hours means that teachers can have better focus on their students and their education through mentoring and the work they do from home, including grading and lesson planning. An award-winning teacher, Melissa Taylor, in "Parenting" magazine said ¨Teachers unions have expressed that they don't want to work longer hours, and trying to persuade them otherwise could be a challenge¨ (¨The Disadvantages of Longer School Days¨). Starting schools later would also result in schools and the entire country saving money. In an article, it stated ¨The United States would realize roughly $9 billion a year in economic gains by instituting a simple, nationwide policy change: starting public school classes no earlier than 8:30 a.m¨ ("Letting teens sleep in would save the country roughly $9 billion a year"). Residents around the school will even benefit from this action because they would pay less tax for public schools.

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.

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

Students would not have a lot of time to do homework or not have any freetime. Families would also like to see their kids after school at three or two thirty not four or three thirty. Families with younger children would have a hard time with child care or babysitters. There would be a very high chance of students having to do a lot of homework which means they would not be able to eat dinner with their families and would not get the chance to hangout with friends or just chill and watch a movie. Also, if kids go to bed early whether they are tired or not, they won’t have a problem with getting up early in the morning.

Starting schools later in the morning would make adolescents and teenagers more alert and able to concentrate more on their school work rather

For example, if school started later, a student who complains about being tired in class could get more sleep, which could ease stress, improve performance, and let them get to school on time without potentially getting into dangerous situations. (dangerous

This schedule change might impact after school sports and clubs, but not by much. It would only involve starting games and practices an hour later, a mere cost for that extra hour of sleep. The bus drivers would simply switch which kids they pick up first. The parents would be grateful to have their little kids out of the house earlier. The students would reap the benefits in their test scores. The small price for this change would benefit everyone.

Secondly, school starting at a later time is beneficial academically. Most teens don’t get enough sleep which causes them to feel sleep deprived and stressed for school. Teens usually get six to seven hours of sleep but Dr. Cora Breuner says, “ We truly believe that our teenagers are getting six to seven hours of sleep a night, and they need eight to 10 (Shute).” This causes teens exhausted for the school and not mentally or physically prepared for each class in school. However, teens who get more sleep do better academically, with better standardized scores and a better quality living style (Shute). For example through one studies, showing the delay by an hour in start time, increases standardized test scores by roughly 3 percentile points (Edwards). So academically it is beneficial for the kids in school.