Is Starting School Early Affecting Teens?

Should school start later than 7 or 8 am? As you go into different grades each year and you enter the middle or high school each year you have to go in earlier. Should this stop?

Starting school later helps students combat the symptoms of sleep deprivation, depression, and memory impairment. Sleep deprivation can be linked to drug and alcohol abuse and higher suicide rates. You can see how sleep can greatly alter your life path.

An average teen needs nine and half hours of sleep. Between school,homework, quizzes, and tests to study for, teens start to lose sleep. Sleep is extremely important because it sets you up for the new day and lets your body rest and reset. Research from an article written by Alexandra Sifferlin states, “Data suggest that two out of three high school students sleep less than 8 hours a night.” This could be a problem for the kids who play sports. Sports games are supposed to start around 4 and end at dark. With school starting later, is might affect this. 

In conclusion, there are many reasons why school should begin to start around nine or ten in the morning. My personal thought is yes, schools should definitely start later. Teens would be able to rest more and focus more.