Zzz...Teenagers need more sleep

School board should consider late start for high school, junior high students

By Russ Carey

, Dec 30, 2009

Guest columnist Russ Carey.

File photo / Estacada News

ADVERTISEMENTS

It is time for the Estacada School District to switch the school starting time of the high school and junior high schools with that of the grade schools. Today’s teens are sleep-deprived.

There are many studies that clearly show that teens need more sleep that they are getting. I believe that the junior high and high school classes should begin later in the morning to help solve this problem.

At present, classes for high school and junior high school students begin at 7:45 a.m., and grade school classes begin at 9:05 a.m. I would like to propose switching these two times. My reasons: Teenagers have more homework, more extra-curricular activities and require more sleep than younger children. This change would give the older students the extra time for the sleep they need to succeed.

In grade school, you can get most of your work done in class or during the time you are at school, but in junior high and high school you always have homework. To do well in school, you can spend anywhere from one to three hours a night on homework. Homework, combined with extra-curricular sports, activities and jobs, could mean staying up very late to be able to get everything done. Getting to bed late means a student will be tired the next day and will not be as alert as he or she should be during school.

There are also biological reasons to back the idea that students learn better when they are allowed to delay school start times to 9 a.m. Researchers say that the circadian timing system (the body’s biological clock) in teenagers favors a later bedtime — sometime around 11 p.m. or later — and that teens require eight hours or more of sleep each night.

I know that I seem to need a lot more sleep than I did when I was in grade school. I live close to school, so I don’t have to get up really early to catch a bus. But I do feel sorry for those kids who might need to catch a bus an hour or more before school just to make it there on time. They must really be tired.

As you can see, there are many reasons why school should begin later for the junior high and high school. More extra-curricular sports and activities, more homework and the biological clock forcing teens to stay up later means that many teens are not getting the sleep they require to do well in school.

If school started an hour later, that would give students one more hour of sleep and this could really make a difference in student performance at school. For all of these reasons, the Estacada School Board should consider switching the start time of the grade schools with that of the junior high and high schools.