The alarm rings like a maniac as the sun is starting to come out—it’s too early to get up already. Unfortunately, Fairfax County Public Schools’ high schools start at 8:10 a.m. and students have to wake up early to get ready for class.
Starting school at a later time promotes many benefits for both students and staff. A few benefits of having school later is that it allows more time for sleep, improvement in academic behavior and performance, less caffeine intake and better physical and mental health.
Sleep should always be a top priority for the students; however, it is common for students to not get enough sleep. For people ages 13 to 18, eight to 10 hours is the recommended amount of sleep, but achieving this goal is difficult because students often balance getting enough sleep with studying, extracurricular activities, free time and more.
Sleep deprivation can lead to several risks including being overweight, not participating in physical activities, suffering from symptoms of depression, engaging in unhealthy risk behaviors like drinking alcohol, and having a poor performance in school. Delaying school would be a solution to not getting enough sleep.
Besides having more time to get sleeping hours in, delayed start times would also affect how a student performs in class. They would be able to focus more on discussions and be more engaged. This is because adequate sleep helps students obtain an increase in memory, attention-span, mental health and well-being.
Moreover, extra sleep can decrease late attendance, poor mood and difficulty in doing homework. Many students are tardy in the morning because they oversleep. Some students from 15-17 years old get less than seven hours of sleep or less which is unhealthy and can lead to health problems such as longevity issues.
If schools started later, students would get enough rest to stay awake throughout the day without coffee or energy drinks. While these drinks help people avoid sleepiness, the amount of caffeine intake is often too much, causing negative effects including feelings of anxiety, insomnia, restlessness and an increase in heart rate.
Furthermore, students and staff can improve physical and mental health if school starts later during the day which could mitigate these effects. The brain rests while sleeping and a lack of it can affect how some parts of the brain will perform. It can cause trouble in decision-making, problem-solving, control of emotions and links back to depression or even risky behavior.
Although there are many benefits, there can also be drawbacks because of this. There will be less time for afterschool activities and sports later in the day because of the shift of the start time of school. This can be hard to manage all the tasks that are needed to be done with a smaller amount of time to do everything. Nonetheless, it’s more important for schools to start later because sleep is needed to help people improve their mind and bodies. Many effects of more sleep are connected to health benefits and that is why schools should start later.
Additionally, a study was conducted with students who had sleep and students who had no sleep participated in an experiment to see who will get higher test scores. As a result, those who had sleep before the test were able to get higher scores rather than those who had no sleep. All this affects your overall performance every day. In order to avoid those effects, schools should start by adjusting the time for school to start a bit later. Changing the schedule so it can be more appropriate for students and staff will provide more sleep to gain and be fitting for everyone.
