A Look at How Changing School Start Times Can Help!

Patricia wakes up at 5:30 every morning to get ready for school, go to track practice, sit through 7 periods of classes and drive directly to SAT tutoring and home just in time to write her term paper. At some point she also gulps down a couple of sodas and inhales a bag of chips while catching up with her girlfriends and trying to find a date to homecoming. When her mother comes up the stairs at 11 pm to tell Patricia to go to sleep, she finds her daughter IM'ing with friends, watching television and doodling in her notepad. Patricia says she is not that sleepy. Despite the fact that she has to wake up at 5:30 am again tomorrow, she feels wide awake, and finds plenty of things to do.

The following Saturday morning Patricia’s mother lets her daughter sleep in until noon. She figures that her overworked child could use the extra time in bed. That night, when Patricia’s mom is fast asleep, Patricia cannot sleep and stays up until 2 am. It will not be easy to wake up at 8 am Sunday morning for her charity car wash.

Patricia does manage to get up in time for the car wash, drinking a huge cup of coffee to help her through the day. When she returns home at 4 pm she crashes in the living room until dinner. Now that she has become accustomed to going to sleep and sleeping later or napping, you can bet that she isn't sleepy when the rest of her family turns in for the night. The cycle of sleepiness for the week is off to a bad start, because Patricia knows she has math team before school the next day.

Patricia, like many in her age group, is affected by psychosocial and biological pressures to stay up and rise later. Studies show that the typical high school student's natural time to fall asleep is often around 11:00 pm. Research shows that adolescents require at least as much sleep as they did as children, generally 9 to 9 1/2 hours each night. NSF’s 2004 Sleep in America poll found that the situation may be even worse: parents said that more than three-fourths of teens 13–18 go to bed 11:00 p.m. or later on school nights. Yet most high schools in the U.S. start by 7:30 am and with busing, teens are getting up as early as 6 am, leaving most with a big sleep debt.

Circadian rhythms, the internal body clock, are thought to regulate the occurrence of sleepiness and alertness. There is a circadian shift during adolescent development that contributes to the delayed sleep times, according to Mary A. Carskadon, PhD, Director of the Chronobiology/Sleep Research Laboratory at Bradley Hospital in East Providence, R.I., and Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at the Brown University School of Medicine. In a study published in the research journal SLEEP in December 1998, "Adolescent Sleep Patterns, Circadian Timing, and Sleepiness at a Transition to Early School Days," Dr. Carskadon and colleagues explained, "Maturational changes in other circadian processes may also play a role, including alterations in intrinsic period, phase alignments or phase response to light."

Tips When Considering Policy Changes for School Start Times

• Start early to educate the community and all parties involved. Use hard data and testimonials. Consider the research and what you hope to gain, not lose. Network with other schools to learn from their experience. Apply what you learn to your school district's particular challenges or concerns.
• Community engagement is key and this means parents, students, teachers, transportation, cafeteria and extracurricular personnel, coaches, employers and others involved in this issue. Understand from the beginning that a change in start times will affect the entire community, and set out to make sure that all of these parties are involved in the process. Involve them in a variety of ways (e-mail, letters, forums, surveys, etc.) and allow them the opportunity to express their opinions anonymously.
• Be clear about your goals. Keep your eye on the bottom line: the academic performance, health, safety and quality of life for students.
• Be flexible. Consider all of the issues, needs and agendas of all parties. Identify potential sources of resistance and address their needs. Be prepared with research and the facts.
• Have a plan. Gather a coalition and form organized committees. Develop a timetable. Decide on guidelines for the change and create goals to measure your progress.

How Do School Start Times Affect Teens and Sleep?

Active schedules and changing circadian rhythms make it challenging for many teens to go to bed at a reasonable hour and wake up in time for the multitude of demands expected of their age group. Since it is common in the United States to stagger school start times for logistical purposes (often busing issues), many adolescents (who are naturally having a difficult time waking up) find themselves leaving for high school earlier than they did in elementary school, even though they need a similar amount of sleep. With the pressure to participate in extra-curricular activities to beef up college applications, many students will wake up as much as two hours or more before the school bell rings to participate in these activities.

Dr. Carskadon's 1998 study examines the response of teens to earlier school start times. The study finds that, "If puberty is associated with a delay, and transition to high school involves a phase advance (earlier start time), then certain teenagers will have difficulty at such a transition, manifesting less sleep and greater daytime sleepiness."

Forty 9th and 10th graders were recruited to participate in this study -- 25 females and 15 males, ages 14 to 16.2 years old. Participants in the two-week study were asked to use an actigraph, which monitors activity and sleep, and to keep a daily sleep diary (see NSF’s Sleepiness Diary ) and they spent the last Friday or Saturday evening of each of the two weeks in the lab. Their saliva was measured to determine the secretion of melatonin (a natural hormone that is secreted in the evening and promotes sleep).

Despite research that suggests nine hours of sleep is optimal for this age group, only 62% of the 9th graders and fewer than half of the 10th graders in this study obtained an average of seven hours of sleep on school nights. The study also found that participants did not adjust their bedtime schedule even though they were forced to wake up earlier for school. They also found that 10th graders secreted melatonin later, contributing to their later sleep times. The study concludes, "Imposition of an early school start time may require unrealistic -- if not unattainable -- bedtimes to provide adequate time for sleeping." This leaves teens sleep deprived throughout the day.

Why Do Schools Have Such Early Start Times?

Given all the research that supports teenagers' sleep cycles, sleep needs and obstacles, students are still required to go to school at the crack of dawn, sometimes before 7 am. Most school districts have a delicately balanced bus transportation system designed to run as efficiently and inexpensively as possible. Using the same buses and drivers to bring all school age children to school saves money and helps distribute traffic during rush hours.

Another issue is after-school programming. Any delay in the start of school will result in a later release time. This reduces time (especially daylight hours) for practice and matches. Many high school students are involved in athletics, with matches and practice starting after school ends. If one school changes its start (and therefore end time) of school, students may have to miss class in order to make it to a match or game on time. In other cases, practice space is shared between schools and there will be more competition for field and gym space, which may result in the cancellation of some programs (such as JV and sports like swimming and golf, which often require the use of facilities during off-peak hours).

Some worry that a later start and release time will leave teachers with less time for their families. Teachers who have created a life around their current schedule may not want to come in and go home later.

Communities Can Make Later School Start Times Work!

Despite the challenges listed above, many districts have found ways to work around obstacles and they have decided to start schools later.

Arlington Public Schools, Virginia

Arlington Public Schools pursued a change in school start times starting in 1999. After a long and detailed decision making process, a change was implemented in September 2001 which gave high school students an extra 45 minutes of sleep. The district administration commissioned a task force which followed strict guiding principles and very thoroughly studied the change and all its related issues.

Although Arlington Public Schools did not formally evaluate the change, they did distribute surveys to all the people involved to evaluate the results of the change. The survey indicated that the high school students felt more alert and prepared and the teachers noticed some improvement in alertness and participation. Although a few noted the personal conflicts they had faced, no teachers left the district as a result of the change. Some parents reported, anecdotally, that their high school students had better attitudes because of the extra sleep.

Fayette County Schools, Kentucky

Fayette County, Kentucky is a large urban district that has over 32,000 students and five high schools. It confronted the issue of school start times when its school board decided to make the high school start even earlier. The resistance to this change initiated a two-year battle between parents to convince the school board of their position on start times. Finally, the board was convinced to delay the start by one hour, and Fayette experienced positive results. Fayette operates on a 4-tier bus system, with elementary schools split into two groups.

Students in every grade from 6 to 12 averaged more sleep in the year after the change, and 12th graders reported getting up to 50 extra minutes of sleep each night. The percent of high school students getting at least 8 hours of sleep per night went from 21% to 51%. In addition, this study looked at the rate of traffic accidents in this school system before and after the change to a later start. While the statewide rate of crashes increased 8% over the two years after the change, Fayette County, which was previously one of the counties with the highest crash rates, reduced its crashes by over 15%.

Wilton School District, Connecticut

Wilton is a small suburban community in the southwest part of the state with about 4,300 students. Wilton is a self-described "sports town." The Wilton Sports Council, a body representing the interests of the little league, soccer clubs and other private sports organizations insisted that any change in start times would lead to the expulsion of Wilton teams from the athletic conference, a price too high to pay for any possible benefit. Second, there were reservations raised by the parents of younger children, who would not reap the benefit of changing starting times, especially if their children now would have to arrive earlier.

In addition, like most other school districts in the country, Wilton's budget was tight and they had to consider options to change start times that would introduce little cost.

Wilton first encountered the issue of later school start times when former

Connecticut Senate President Kevin Sullivan gave a presentation on the issue to the Wilton League of Women Voters (WLWV) in October 2001. In response to this, the WLWV assembled a committee to investigate the issue and write a report on their findings. WLWV invited the Superintendent and the Board of Education to attend a presentation on the findings. The Superintendent was receptive to considering this recommendation, and after conducting some research of his own, was convinced of its merits. Several of the Board members were also part of the WLWV, so administration was supportive from the early moments of the effort for change.

Wilton’s start time change was a resounding success. Teachers recognized a change in student behavior: they were more awake, had better attitudes, and were overall more pleasant to work with. Parents also reported changes in their kids’ attitudes, and became increasingly supportive as they adjusted to the new routines.

Teachers who also coached at the schools were concerned before the change that they would be unable to make it to practices, but this turned out not to be a problem. Wilton High School had one of its best athletic seasons, even earning several state championships. The high school athletic programs saw a continued rise in participation.

The three impacted schools -- middle, high and upper elementary -- participated in a survey that showed large majorities at all schools reported satisfaction with the change. The following fall, the local sleep disorders center administered a sleep survey in the high school, with results showing that the students were, in fact, sleeping an extra hour each morning.

The WLWV has also maintained an internet-based message board for ongoing questions, comments and concerns about the change of start times. They have held several public hearings and town forums to allow discussion of these comments.

The Norwalk Hospital Sleep Disorders Center, which conducted the sleep study before the change, continued with a follow up survey to assess the change. They used a shortened version of the self-administered School Sleep Habits Questionnaire, which asks questions about sleep, sleepiness and grades. The results have shown that Wilton High School students are getting more sleep per night than before the change. Compared to the early start time, twice as many students reported that they did not experience daytime sleepiness.

This article was published in the Summer 2005, Volume 7, Issue 3 of sleepmatters.