24
votes
Adolescents in the US are chronically sleep-deprived, in part because most schools start too early. This summer, California will become the first state in the nation to require later start times.
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- Title
- The State Finally Letting Teens Sleep In
- Authors
- Lisa L. Lewis
- Published
- Jun 8 2022
- Word count
- 926 words
Talking to American friends about their school experience is always wild for me. I couldn't imagine dragging my teenage self out of bed to reach school before 8 every morning. I've never personally known a school to start classes at any time other than exactly 9am.
That's what we did in HK, but then it probably didn't take as long to get into school - even during rush hour - because of the infrastructure. It was still shite. I also don't know if these kids generally go to sleep a lot later than I used to, but I assume so because of the opioid epidemic.
I don’t understand what you’re saying here
It's OK, sometimes I put things in there just for me!
I wake my middle schooler (13 years old) up at 5:55am every weekday in order to make it to the bus stop on time. Every single time is a challenge. Ughh…
Sounds like my old routine Kindergarten to 9th grade.
Wake up at 5:50 AM to get dressed and try to eat breakfast (I almost never did). Catch the school bus at 7:00 AM. Ride the school bus for an hour and get to school at 8:00 AM. Too late for morning breakfast at school since class started at 8:10 AM. School dismisses at 3:10 PM. Bus doesn't arrive until 3:30 PM. Get dropped off at 5:00 PM.
Then when I'm at home, I better not have any after school sports because I would only have like 30 minutes to eat before I left for that. Then that takes an hour to hour and a half. Then maybe have dinner if I already haven't had it around 7:30 or 8:00. Then do either homework, video games, or TV until 9:30-10:00. Then rinse and repeat 5 freaking days a week for 180 days a year, for 10 years.
Pure hell honestly. Especially school years where we had super strict teachers, then it really felt like kid prison.
I didn't learn to love learning until I was in my 20s as a result of that.
How far did you live from your school? That's honestly a crazy commute, especially for a kid.
Directly driving to the elementary school was ~13 miles. But on the way to the elementary school, you had to stop by the high school and then the middle school, but in between all the stops we were still picking up people. I was fortunate though that I wasn't one of the kids who had to wait at either the high school or the middle school to transfer busses. My county had like five elementary schools, two middle schools, and a high school to cover ~437mi² for a county 60 miles long.
As an American I’m so glad I’m done with this BS and can show up to work when I’m awake instead of waking up to go to work.
I seem to remember some studies that teenagers naturally go to bed later and wake up later than both children and adults, so it isn’t a matter of voluntary adjustment, it is genuinely disrupting to their normal sleep schedule.
Edit: Here’s some more info.
My school used to start at 07:10. It was hell.