Why School Should Start Later Essay

Should School Start Times Be Pushed Back?

Do you ever wonder why you're so tired getting up for school? Or why we can’t stay awake in the first periods of class? Well i’ll tell you why. Middle and High school students need a required 8-11 hours of sleep. Most teenagers usually go to sleep around 12 am, and school starts around 7:30 am. That is not enough sleep for teenagers. We usually get up about 6 am to start getting dressed and all set for school, and the buses come pick you up 30 minutes later. Once again we’re not getting enough sleep.

Students test scores are falling due to lack of sleep because school starts so early. “A new Swedish study shows that adolescents who suffer from sleep disturbance or habitual short sleep duration are less likely to succeed academically compared to those who enjoy a good night’s

sleep.” said the Science daily website. It’s proven that when students get more sleep, their test scores and attendance improve by a lot. So if we could push the start times for school back about an hour or two, the lack of attention that students give would be so much better.

When teenagers don’t get enough sleep, they tend have a habit of waking up really moody or with a bad attitude. I’m 15, I wake up with a bad attitude every morning cause it’s too early to get up for school. I think if school started at 8:30 am or 9:30 am we would have less trouble trying to focus at school or to
even stay up. I don’t think many people realize how sleep affects behavior, i’ll explain it in a second.

Your sleep and your mood are easily connected. Did you know that not having enough sleep can cause irritability or even stress? Yeah, a lot of people didn’t know. Not getting enough sleep will most likely increase the risk of developing a mood disorder, like depression or anxiety. So why would you put a teenager in that predicament.

” New evidence suggests that a later start to the school day could have all sorts of benefits, like better grades and fewer car crashes.” said Sleeping blogs.
Teens that drive to school are most likely to get into a car accident because they don’t get enough sleep. More than half of licensed teens have said they have fallen asleep at the wheel, and that they are entirely to tired to stay awake or drive their best. It’s way to dangerous to be tired and still try to drive just to get to school.

"Most people wake up to alarms, because they don't naturally wake up at the time when they have to get up and go to work,” Kelley tells Webb.

"So we've got a sleep deprived society - it's just that this age group, say 14-24 in particular, is more deprived than any other sector.” said Kelley. That just proves that our schools need to start later, because there is no way possible to make every teenager be able to get up on their own.

Getting enough sleep is important for the students academic performance, health, and safety. Did you know that your sleep plays a part in healing your heart and blood vessels? Yeah crazy right? Or did you know that a student is more likely to succeed when they have enough sleep? It’s amazing how your

body functions, that’s why it’s very important for teens to get at least 8-10 hours of sleep.

When teenagers get up to go to school, their ability to concentrate is not there. Some student even fall asleep daily in class. Trying to stay awake at school is hard for some teens. Teenagers that are involved in after school activities like sports, are more likely to drink a lot of caffeine like energy drinks or even

coffee.

Teenagers that get the required 8-10 hours of sleep are more likely to get A’s and B’s. Students that don’t get enough sleep get really bad grades because they can’t focus, concentrate or stay awake. Teenagers who don’t get enough sleep are the ones that fall asleep in at least one or two class periods a day. “28% of students say they fall asleep in class at least once or a couple of times in a week.” Said West High’s Newspaper. Usually when students end up coming to school it’s because their late, and when they're late, they're excuse is that they overslept.

Caffeine filled beverages, like most pops, coffee, or even energy drinks play a big role in students not getting enough sleep. Electronics can also play a part in reasons why we don’t go to sleep early as we can. Teenagers are completely obsessed with electronics and it get’s the point where they can’t sleep because they're either watching television, on social media, or playing game systems.

Going to school really in the morning has a big impact on sleep. Teenagers have a habit of staying up late to work on homework, surfing the internet and many other things. Students don't realize that they will have to get up a few hours later. It’s not really something you can change. So maybe if we pushed school start times back a little bit later, we would be able to wake up with no problems, stress, being
sleepy, or having troubles staying focused or awake in class.

In conclusion I just want to say that yes, I have problems getting up in the morning, i’m moody or have an attitude, and it’s hard to stay awake in class or school period. I think that with later start times our society in general will be so much better and so will our schools. I believe that if we have later start times that test scores, and attendance percentages will shoot up like a rocket, I believe it will, so will you?