Why School Should Start Later
I imagine most teenagers would agree that school should start later. After spending countless hours on homework and sports, all we want to do is sleep. But homework and sports keep teenagers up late at night, causing sleep deprivation and constant tiredness. Sleep is essential for the function of humans, and one of the main reasons teenagers do not sleep enough is because of the early start times in school.
In 2014, based on the School Health Policies and Practices Study, 93% of high schools and 83% of middle schools in the United States started before 8:30 a.m. Moreover, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine suggests that teenagers from 13-18-years-old should sleep 8-10 hours per day on average for good health. Many problems can arise from not getting enough sleep: teenagers can become overweight, become less engaged in physical activities, suffer from depression or other symptoms, engage in drinking and drugs, or perform poorly in school. When teens go through puberty, they tend to stay up later, which means they need to sleep later in the morning. The combination of going to bed late and waking up early for school results in most adolescents not getting enough sleep.
I interviewed people from Walton, Alpharetta High School, and Galloway to gather more information about whether others felt similar to me on wanting school to start later. Five out of six students think that school should start later. Their responses included:
“Yes. School is hard, and a majority of the time people have activities after school. With the homework load, most people to bed really late, and waking up really early is not good for your health.”
“Yes. It is dark when we get to school which is not healthy and makes it really hard.”
“Yes, I want to sleep in.”
“Ya, I think it should start later because my brain works better when I get more sleep and the later school starts, the later I can sleep in, which means I can get more sleep. And you need your brain for school.”
Based on this feedback and research, we can tell that teenagers are not sleeping enough. None of the people I interviewed are getting the recommended 8-10 hours of sleep and nearly all wished school would start later. High school is packed with tough academic years and commitments to sports and later start times would make it easier for students to tackle these things.
By Ella Katz