High school students everywhere may rejoice to hear the latest research on school start times for students in their age group.
A new report from the Education Commission of the States (www.ecs.org) says school begins too early for these students, a point about which there should be no dispute.
Following are three key takeaways from the report:
1. Research shows adolescents, driven to later wake/sleep times by their biological clocks, lose as much as an average of 2.7 hours of sleep on school days.
2. There is virtually unanimous agreement in the research community that later start times in adolescent education would produce a positive change in adolescent learning, health, and safety.
3. Few, if any, educational interventions are so strongly supported by research evidence from so many different disciplines and experts in the field.
Following is the link to the report: http://www.ecs.org/clearinghouse/01/12/19/11219.pdf
The conclusions of this report will certainly be useful to the state of Maryland, which passed a bill earlier this spring to study school start times. Montgomery County Public Schools (MD), one of the largest school districts in the nation, has already been studying the issue, and Superintendent Joshua Starr has recommended moving school start times back 50 minutes.
See the related link to an article about the MD bill: http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/teen-sleep-state-to-study-health-issues-and-school-start-times/2014/04/04/aec97254-bc29-11e3-9a05-c739f29ccb08_story.html
