Essay On High School Start Time

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Over the past few years, there has been a continual debate over changing the high school start time. In my opinion, start times should be delayed to promote students’ health and to increase academic performance. In Saratoga High School, there was a recent discussion about a change in their school schedule. Many parents fought for a new start time of 8:15 AM instead of the current time of 7:50 AM. Bill Mistele, the superintendent of the Los Gatos-Saratoga Joint Union School District, and the board decided to grant this change. Evidently, this shows that schools see the reasonableness and have allowed a change in the start times. In an article titled, “Should High Schools Ring a Later Bell?” it presents many reasons that schools decide against the idea. For example, The Jackson Hole school district believed if there were any changes in the schedule, it would …show more content…

Other recent research supports this idea. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommend for schools to begin at 8:30 AM or even later. In addition, a report from the Centers of Disease Control (CDC) and the U.S Department of Education suggest that a later bell would avoid bad academic performances and health risks, such as obesity, drinking alcohol, smoking and illegal drug use (Viadero, High Schools Should Start Later, Report Says). The authors argue that modifying school start times are crucial to prevent health risks. Clearly, a change in school start times would benefit the student’s and the school. Students who are sleep deprived can't learn at their best, but with a later start time students can focus more. Most students in high school get seven hours of sleep or less, but the recommended amount of hours is at least 8. Schools should push for more hours of sleep because the more sleep students get more ready they are to learn. If school start times were to be pushed out, it would help a student’s well being and the

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