This article was written by Addison Schliewe
Groggy. School. Mornings. The one thing you need is to find your bed and to skip the school work, but you can’t. These days definitely make you wonder what it would be like with school starting later allowing for more sleep.
Students often struggle with waking up in the morning to get ready for school, sometimes showing up late. In the state of Michigan, you need 1,098 hours of instruction, not including passing time or lunch time. This leaves many days of school and a small amount of days to miss. Days off really are not an option. When most of the students and staff are tired and have minimal energy, we have to learn how to function. If school started later many people would benefit from the extra sleep time.
The High School class schedule currently starts at 7:25 A.M. I struggle to get out of bed in order to complete my morning routine and get to the bus on time with school starting this early. If the school day started at 7:45 A.M., I would be more prepared for the day. With more sleep time, I believe that I, and other students, can improve our focus during our lessons with a little more sleep to energize our brains. So many people every day rely on energy drinks to focus, and so many people complain about how energy drinks are so bad for you, but how else are students supposed to stay awake in class.
Staff can sometimes often run a little late, showing up just before class starts. Geometry and Advanced Algebra two teacher, Becky Fase, explains her struggles of school starting so early.
“I’m not a morning person. I have at least a 30 minute commute, so I don’t like it. I just don’t feel like your day starts well because you’re starting so incredibly early,” Fase said. “I feel like students also struggle, and not necessarily by their own fault, struggle to get here on time. And so, I preferred when we used to start prior to COVID, when we started at 7:45.”
Sometimes waking up late happens, and that often causes students to run behind schedule. Freshman Ashley Giller often struggles as I do to get to school on time.
“I only give myself around half an hour, so I can still get enough sleep, and because I take the bus, there’s so much I have to do, so I do end up rushing myself a lot, which causes me to stress,” Giller said.
With more sleep, students’ brains are more focused on the lesson and getting their work done. Freshman Marisa Rich explains how her work ethic improves with more sleep.
“I usually do more work when I have more sleep, ’cause I feel more energized,” Rich said. “My brain feels more alert, and it feels more ready versus when I don’t have sleep, I feel sluggish and I just want to leave.”
Freshman Jasmin Dekraker’s mood and mental outlook hinge on how much sleep she gets. And mood often dictates how well a student engages in the classroom.
“Well I find that if I don’t get enough sleep, I’m not very happy, and I’m just wanting to go home. But then when I actually get sleep, then, I’m actually okay,” Dekraker said.
Sleep is very important to not just students, but also staff. Without enough sleep it often leads to drowsy classrooms where there are more students’ heads on their desks than actually listening to the teacher speak about the lesson. Another reason is that focus improves with more sleep, meaning better grades, better mood, and overall a better mindset for the day ahead. I think students would do better in school when they are more awake.
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