According to The National Sleep Foundation, teenagers in middle school and high school require 8 to 9 and half hours of sleep each night. However, research has shown that most teenagers average fewer than 7 hours of sleep on school nights. As a result, I believe there is a direct correlation between early school start times and the effects of sleep deprivation. The impact of sleep deprivation in students results in their inability to stay awake and learn at school, as well as contributing to drowsy driving, irritability and sometimes, violence. A 208 study published in the journal Science Advances found that when the start time of school was pushed back, students were able to increase the amount of sleep they got by a half hour to a full hour. The study ultimately concluded that, Given the widespread negative effects sleep deprivation has on adolescent physical and mental health, our study points to the value of a measure such as delaying the school start time toward improving teenage sleep. This survey, including countless others, makes it clear that students need more sleep for their mental and physical health, and academic learning. The positive impact of additional sleep will decrease the effects of sleep deprivation, including daytime drowsiness and increasing their ability to be alert while in a learning environment. Ultimately, moving back start times will improve students overall health.
It is also clear that the quality of sleep, and when students sleep, is just as important as the quantity of sleep. Teenagers natural sleep cycles tend to track to later bedtimes as they are busy with, after school activists, work and
homework. As found in a recent study, most teenagers fall asleep around p.m. or later, because the change in their internal clocks make them feel awake at night, even though they are really exhausted. Ensuring a teenager goes to bed earlier to achieve the recommended hours of sleep per night does not only affect their natural sleep cycle, but it is also realistically impossible. This is further explained by Mary A. Carskadon, MD, Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Brown University, who stated that Even without the pressure of biological changes (natural sleep cycles), if we combine an early school starting timesay 7:30 a.m., with a modest commute, makes 6:5 a.m. a viable rising timewith our knowledge that optimal sleep needs is 9 /4 hours, we are asking that 6-year olds go to bed at 9 p.m.. With it being a simple math equation accounting for bedtime, sleep time, rising time and school time, many schools across the country are now working to synchronize school clocks with students natural sleep cycles. This enables school-aged teenagers to be their most alert hours and achieve their full academic potential. On the contrary, when teens are not in school during their most alert hours it impacts their ability to pay attention, and at worst, fall behind. Additionally, CDC has outlined that During puberty, adolescents become sleepy later at night and need to sleep later in the morning as a result in shifts in biological rhythms. As such, it is important for schools to consider a later start time that accounts for natural sleep cycles, respectfully allowing teenagers the best chance for long term success.