November 8, 2018
On Tuesday Oct. 30, the School Committee voted to delay Lexington High School’s start times from 7:45 to 8:30 a.m. The decision was made after months of discussion surrounding the relationship between early start times and student stress levels.
“Adequate sleep is essential for the health and wellbeing of teenagers, and with a first bell at 7:45, we are asking our high school students to fight their own bodies and be awake and highly functional... much too early in the day,” Kathleen Lenihan, a member of the School Committee, said.
Even 45 minutes can make a difference to high school students, who often stay up late to complete homework or study for assessments.
“We know that adolescents, in general, are biologically hard wired to go to sleep no earlier than 11 p.m. and wake up around 8 a.m.,” Lenihan said. “This is due to the normal shifts in circadian rhythm that accompany puberty.”
Many students are excited about the change.
“I’ll have more time to sleep and relax in the morning if we start a bit later,” Sachiv Chakravarti, a junior, said. “Right now getting ready for school makes me wake up earlier than I want.”
Student athletes are also enthusiastic about the later start times, even if it intervenes with practice schedules.
“It’ll be great to get more sleep,” Micah Benson, a junior, said. “We already start track practice at 3:15 so we can delay it a bit and still have enough light out to run.”
There are important downsides to acknowledge. If the high school gets out later than middle schools, clubs like Model UN and Diamond Debate Club, which are run by high school students, might no longer be feasible.
“I’m afraid that kids will miss the opportunity to learn to speak their minds and bond with kids they don’t normally talk to over debate—it’s the place where I found my friends in middle school, and holds some of my funniest memories,” Caroline Li, a junior and teaching assistant at Diamond Debate Club, said.
Overall, however, this is a step in the right direction. We’ve seen a succession of insufficient stress reduction efforts, which failed because they treated symptoms, not causes. Coping activities like rock decorating and quad painting have their place, but they won’t counter a culture of exhaustion and all-nighters. It is invigorating to see the School Committee combat structural causes of stress, rather than supply band-aid solutions. Hopefully, future changes will further this trend.
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