But that's just me.
I don't understand this push to start schools later. I'm told that studies show that a later start time is better for teenagers, but I have questions that remain unanswered:
1) Kids on farms get up early.
2) Kids throughout history have gotten up early.
3) Do kids in other countries have this "late start time" issue, or is this strictly a US phenomenon?
4) Has the problem gotten significantly worse in the age of handheld electronics? In other words, is this partly a self-inflicted problem?
Is the problem such a major issue that it requires the intervention of the state legislature?
California lawmakers have rejected a bill to delay school start times, but the measure will likely resurface in January.Here's an argument for local control:
The California School Boards Association, the leading opponent of the bill, argues that local school boards should be in control of start times and that a one-size-fits-all approach will not work for all 3,000 secondary schools in the state. The association says the bill will increase the need for supervision before school, create hardships for working families and wreak havoc on schools that purposely stagger start times to meet student demand for bus transportation. Rural districts could apply for a waiver to postpone implementation.Sacramento knows best.
Local control should be the solution, but that doesn't sit well with the "Equality Macht Frei" lefty crowd.
ReplyDeleteIn Ireland, secondary schools start around 9:00 - an hour to an hour and a half later than their American counterparts. Yet, there was also a movement over here to delay school start times, because pupils aren't getting enough sleep. Luckily, officials decided against it. Lack of sleep is certainly a serious issue - studies have shown that chronic sleep deprivation can lead to permanent brain damage (which I imagine would be particularly damaging to adolescents, whose brains are still forming) - but I do not think that this is the way to go about it. Teenagers, like adults, prefer to go to bed late. If American high schools start at 9:00 instead of 8:00, I expect that pupils would temporarily arrive at school more rested, and perform better. Then, once they adjusted to the new start time, they would go to bed an hour later, and show up just as sleep deprived as Irish pupils do. Other than perhaps decrease homework, I am not sure that there is much schools can do to ensure that their pupils are more rested - that is the responsibility of the parents. And, the truth is, once the children become adults and enter the work force, they will have to wake up at a certain time (typically earlier than they'd like) to ensure they arrive at work on time. It is the responsibility of the pupils and their parents to make sure that pupils are not up all night on their mobiles or computers.
ReplyDeleteI had serious insomnia as a teen. I could never fall asleep before 1:30am. It was not for want of trying. I'd be exhausted and in bed by 11, but then would lie awake for hours, desperate to fall asleep. The weekends were time to catch up. I often stayed in when my friends went out, and slept to 11am. Still, I had to be up at 6:30 most school days, so a week's sleep averaged about 6 hours a night. MDs recommend teens get 9.
ReplyDeleteI once went to get an eye exam because I couldn't see the board in class. My eyes were fine, I was told I was just tired, literally bleary-eyed. Somehow I managed to finish just barely in the top 10% of my high school class, but I've wondered whether I would have had an easier time if I could have slept. It never crossed my mind that it was a medical condition or that my parents or an MD could have helped. I don't think my parents even knew it was happening. Volleyball season was the worst, since we had practice before school.
I do think the stress level for middle and upper middle class kids is much higher than it used to be. There are far more people trying to get into colleges (both domestic and international students) than there used to be, but the number of places at selective colleges has not kept pace.
It is also not just about grades. To get into a good school, you have to have invented a cure for malaria, started a charity to raise a billion dollars to provide your miraculous malaria cure to the poor of the world, lobbied Congress and the UN for funding, and then written, produced and starred in a Broadway musical based on your experiences...all while taking 7 AP's all four years of high school, participating in at least three sports at the varsity level, playing club and travel ball, and being the star thespian at your school and president of your school's student council.
Kids who don't live up to those kinds of expectations drive themselves nuts with work and with anxiety.
We're torturing our kids.
A "good school". The two most brilliant people I know both went to state schools, one to Sacramento State and one to San Francisco State. They both got engineering degrees and make/made many multiples of what I do in a year. And even today, you don't need to have cured malaria (although I love that line!) to get into Sac State. We torture kids when we teach them that getting into Sac State instead of Berkeley is a failure.
ReplyDeleteBut anyway, I have a one-time solution. Pick a fricken time zone and stick with it! No more of this silly changing clocks twice a year. It's deadly in the spring.
We have a senior in the midst of the college search. We keep telling her not to worry, that it doesn't matter much where you go, it matters what you do when you get there. She doesn't buy it and is freaking out. Teens don't have the experience to know that they're going to be okay even if they have to start at a CC. They just don't get that. It's also a time when everything you have done for the last 6 years is scrutinized and judged. It's painful. It's also the first adult-world decision these kids make and can be a challenge just to step up.
ReplyDeleteIt makes it worse when they know some of their classmates are going to Ivies or other prestige schools, but when asked, they're going to have to say they're going to Podunk U.
Darren,
ReplyDeleteIn high school I started class at 730, and there was no issue. Fast forward to college and we had PT at 600 or 630, then class at 800. I assume you had something similar and I know you would rather have a later day, but did you have any issue with relatively early days at the academy?
Even moving classes later-8:30 in our case-there are still kids late. And they use all kinds of excuses such as too much homework or late jobs or late sport practices. In almost every case these same kids admit to playing games online or texting or watching movies for HOURS before they start working. Blue screens on computers and phones are known to make sleep difficult for adults. And adults should step in and make sure teens are getting work done and getting to sleep at a reasonable time. I will say that when I had to be at work at 7:00 and my son and daughter had to be dropped off at 6:20 for marching band and drill team rehearsals it was a pretty brutal couple of years, but we survived.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to believe that the human race has changed so drastically since the invention of gas lights/electricity that we can't manage to build our daily schedules more or less around the available hours of sunlight. I really think the push towards later school days is driven by technology and entertainment that keep us up six hours past sundown.
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