Sleep and Starting the School Day Later
By Albert B. Kelly
If you had to name one thing that almost every one of us needs more of it would be sleep. Try as we might, the vast majority of us are walking around tired and sleep-deprived. If you are a reasonably healthy adult, the National Sleep Foundation says we are to get roughly 7 to 9 hours of sleep per night but achieving that is far from simple or easy.
For one thing, we live in a completely wired world and while it is seemingly within our capability to turn down the lights, turn of the TV, silence the smartphone, click off the laptop, and pull the shades in pursuit of more sleep, it is difficult to do. Much of it has to do with the pace of modern life. We are always on and plugged in. But more than that, the expectation is that we should always be on and plugged in.
Go back a few decades and you will note that Americans did not have the internet, home computers, smart devices, or social media and many television stations signed off the air at a decent hour though you could find the “Late Movie” if you really needed it. Most businesses closed in late afternoon so that the pace of life had boundaries and the expectations to be accessible were far less.
I’m not sure exactly when it changed, but somewhere along the way we made heroes out of entrepreneurs who sleep four or five hours a night all in the name of moving fast and breaking things or reimagining a better mousetrap or whatever. Somehow getting less sleep and needing less sleep has been equated with being properly driven and more dedicated to success.
Yet for all of that, doctors and sleep experts tell us that a chronic lack of proper sleep contributes to all sorts of conditions including high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and heart disease to name a few and I would think that the link between poor sleep and multiple mental health concerns, such as depression, anxiety, and suicide will become even more obvious as more research is completed.
While the recommendation for us adults is 7 to 9 hours of sleep, children and teens need even more sleep as their bodies grow and develop. That’s why I was glad to learn of a recent bill (S-2462) sponsored by State senators Vin Gopal and Richard Codey that would require the school day for high schoolers to start no earlier than 8:30am local New Jersey time.
The bill is tied to schools and districts receiving State aid including charter schools, renaissance school projects, county vocational schools, and special services schools serving grades 9 through 12.
The bill takes into consideration two things; namely that teenagers need 8 to 10 hours of sleep as a matter of course and that their internal clocks (i.e. circadian rhythm) have them up later at night and therefore sleeping later in the morning. That your typical teen can barely drag themselves out of bed early in the morning is not a sign of laziness, but simply the biology of adolescence. That is why the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that middle and high schools start at 8:30 AM or later in order to give students a shot at getting the right amount of sleep.
Legislation to address the issue is not unique to New Jersey. A similar law, the first of its kind nationally, just went into effect in California and it requires public high schools to start at 8:30am or later, while middle schools are to start at 8:00am or later.
Implementing this change will not necessarily be easy. I would imagine that coordinating school bus transportation will be challenging as will ensuring that students get the required amount of classroom time during the academic year. The change in start times will also present logistical issues for parents and educators in terms of rearranging daily routines. Regardless, I think making the adjustments to accommodate the sleep needs of high school students will pay dividends over the long haul in terms of health and productivity.
Consider that a 2022 Casper-Gallup report on sleep in America tells us that lost productivity due to lack of sleep costs the U.S economy an estimated $44.6 billion each year in unplanned absenteeism from work. Getting enough sleep is no small thing and there’s value in trying to build good sleep habits into the next generation.