Written by Tanner Knauf, 7th grade –
Hate waking up for school? Studies show the effects of starting school just 30 minutes later can be amazing. Did you know that Nevada had the 5th earliest middle school start time in America? Sleep is the most important factor in how your day goes, so why restrict it? With the amount of homework and extracurricular activities, it can be hard to get the full American Pediatric Association (APA) recommended 9 hours or more of sleep. Having a start time of 8:30 could do incredible things for the kids at school. Studies show that making school start later can improve test scores by three percent. According to the research, kids who struggle the most in school tend to have the most improved grades.
Do you find yourself not liking the first period? Well, that’s probably because it’s the first period of the day. Many students complain that they used to like their first period class, but now they have it first thing and, hence, have stopped liking it as much. Ever noticed a better day on delayed starts? That’s probably because you got more sleep! “There is nothing that is done better with lack of sleep,” Lisa Lewis stated during her visit to LTS on March 21st. She also talked about how teens are going through a sleep crisis and how we can fix it. Ms. Lewis said, “A day is like a pie, and no matter how you split it, you only have 24 hours.” After this, she talked about how school has gotten harder and now takes up more and more of our day, but we still have the same amount of time which can make it very hard to get proper sleep. Ms. Lewis mentioned that the addition of cell phones in teens’ lives has drastically impacted teen sleep.
School surveys state students are waking up as late as 7:30 to maximize their sleep. All around having a later start is shown to improve student academics and morale in all different ways.
Tanner Knauf is a Lake Tahoe School student and a journalist for our school newspaper.