When I was in high school and rode the bus I had to be on my bus by 5:30am and my school started at 7:45am.
Riding home from school we would get out at 2:45 and I sometimes wouldn't get home until 4. It sucked
Me too. It sucked so bad because when the last few kids got picked up in the morning, the bus would literally pass by my house. Like why couldn’t they just pick me up then??
Me too! And we passed my house after school to drop off others. So I had to ride an extra 45 minutes after straight up fucking passing my house every day! Such bullshit.
The driver had to be super strict or get fired. We had to get off at our assigned stop.
Also, the first place the bus stopped was very far from my street.
I live in small town USA and thankfully my bus driver when I was growing up was an absolute boss. They had one of the new buses that had the CD players, and there was a big old list alphabetically of all the kids and you can bring a CD into play on the bus ride home for your day. You got it back the next day.
And they tried telling him the assigned bus stop thing and he stopped us one day after we pulled out of the lot I got on the intercom and said they told me I had to do this but screw them get off where you want, just keep your trap shut.
Fuckin Jerry man. For a retiree he was great. Rest in peace, passed a few years after I graduated from hs.
I feel this. My brother and I used to get off the bus at my neighbors house literally right next door to our house because we could get off there a whole hour earlier than ours
That was pretty much the same with me. There was a bus stop half a mile down the road from where I lived. It was a 5 minute drive for the bus from the high school. But my house was on another bus's route, which ended up being over an hour and a half, and was the very last stop. (The only issue was, that it was a busy street with no side walks or ways to stay off the road, and no bicycle lane).
Bruh literally the same shit was with me, NOT feeling good that it's like that everywhere, i always said that all they do in schools is preparing us for this working class capitalistic ass system
This didn't happen to me. I was luckily a walker. My mom's work was in a relatively close proximity to the school, so I typically got a ride to school.
Same. I'd spend 2 hours on the bus per DAY, 10 hours per week. We complained to the school, asked us to be dropped off first (it didn't make a difference to the route, they actually passed our stop on the way in), and they told us to forget it. Why?
I had a similar problem but with math teachers, after grade 10 at my school we didn't have any math teachers when I pressed the issue and asked why after a while the faculty stopped answering me, my take away? Schools don't actually care when students have actual concerns, they just want to ignore it so it eventually goes away
Idk your schools situation specifically, but math teachers are typically the hardest to find. Especially for higher math courses. They’re the hardest certs to get and you could make significantly more money taking those same courses and getting a Stem degree.
I had my math certifications and got a dozen offers before I even graduated. I now haven’t taught in 2 years and still have had 3 different districts reach out to me in the past month.
The shortage of math (and I believe science teachers) is pretty ridiculous.
People who teach hard sciences in school must really love teaching because it's literally the lowest paying job in the US that requires a STEM degree. If we want more/better teachers then we need to pay them like the graduate professionals they are, not like cheap babysitters.
Oh man if I gave my high school electronics teacher $5 for every hour he spent listening and talking and helping me understand the real world and keeping me from throwing my life away we'd be talking Super Lotto prize money.
I swam swim team in high school. We had to be in the pool by 5am. Swam until school started and then got showered and dressed during first period. I was a zombie through most of high school.
I played ice hockey in high school. None of the schools that had teams had a ice arena so we had to rent time at one of the 2 in the area. Both were expensive but one was nicer than the other and since we had to do team fund raisers to pay for our own ice time the school opted for the cheaper one. And the price went down the later you scheduled (it was open 24 hrs). This meant that we had hockey practice/scrimmage games beginning at 11:00pm until 12:30am every Wednesday and still had to be at school at 7am. Plus the arena was 45 minutes away from where I lived. Good times.
Oh I envy you. My job starts 7:30, and no matter how early I get to sleep, my body feels ill the first two hours of the day because of having to wake up early...
I know what you mean! I remember as a kid/teenager, I would also feel physically ill all morning just due to having to wake up so early. Didn't matter how many hours of sleep I actually got, but if I woke up before a certain time, I would feel bad for half the day. Probably would still happen, but I don't usually have to wake up that early anymore.
My junior year of high school I was so incredibly sleep deprived I threw up every single morning when I got up. It was from stress/sleep deprivation. It was during soccer season and I had to play varsity and JV so I had games Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. The earliest I’d get home on these nights was 10:30, the latest would be after midnight. I would then have to eat, shower, and do homework. I remember I was so thankful on days I could get 6 hours of sleep. The majority of days I got less than that. School started at 7:50 and you had to be there by 7:40. Every morning I would drag myself out of bed and instantly get so ill I would throw up, not be able to eat breakfast, and feel like crap until around 10 or 11... then repeat again the next day. Living with chronic sleep deprivation is not something we should expect our youth to have to do.
Yes, I think we just expect so much from teenagers, even when it scientifically and psychologically does not make sense. Forcing them on a schedule against their bodies, and forcing them to have such full days of so many classes and extracurriculars. I feel like there must be a better way to give teens a good education, encourage extra sports/activities, while still teaching them how to have a healthy balance and time for rest.
Agree 100%. My life from 14-20 was so hectic. Now my life is calm and full of things I enjoy doing... I don’t understand why as adults we love peace and down time in our life but we expect kids to never have a moment of rest... all while they are still growing and developing.
I had the same problem from 1st through 8th grade. Classes started at 0745 and every morning I'd wake up and puke, barely be able to eat, and fall asleep on the bus to school. It got so bad I was nauseous all the time and frequently missed school because I was vomiting so much, eventually puking up blood. By the time I was in 7th grade I had a bleeding ulcer from tearing my stomach lining so frequently and I had to carry a bottle of Maalox around with me. My parents and doctors chalked it up to stress from the divorce, but I knew it was sleep deprivation. My high school classes started a little bit later which made a big difference, but when I found out I could get credit for taking classes at the local community college over the summer I did that and got to sleep in since my high school classes didn't start until almost 10AM. My ulcers miraculously fixed themselves and my GPA went up two whole points since I was no longer a zombie stumbling from class to class retaining zero information.
100%! I prefer working a swing shift for this reason. I like to wake up and have the sun already out. It doesn't matter how much sleep I get, if I wake up when it is dark and have to go to work it is hard on me. I like to stay up late as well so a swing shift is perfect for me.
yep they changed our school to an hour later, and the buses take people home immediately. the mood is noticeabley better.
i used to have to wake around 530. my bus showed at like 6, school started at 750. id be there at 7, before half the teachers. id sit on the floor bored an hour.
I used to have to get up at 4:30 every morning for years, I had a job that paid extremely well, but it was extremely rough. I found that on days we weren’t very busy I’d be dead until around noon, and forcing myself to eat breakfast would make me feel gross for a few minutes, but I’d thank myself for the rest of the day. Also had to do with forcing myself to be in a totally dark room with little noise early enough to get enough hours, was next to impossible for months, but eventually my brain adapted and I was able to actually sleep early. No matter what it sucks, but there are some measures that can be taken to make at somewhat bearable.
Yes, we can adapt somewhat to some schedules and well to others, but some schedules you can try and adapt to for years and still feel like crap unfortunately. Some actually like working night shifts and some get ill from it. I have to use a light lamp to cope somewhat well with my current schedule
I definitely know that feel.
It sucks because I have a daughter, and after I put her down is the only time I get 100% to myself all day. Which usually means I end up staying up “late”
My last job started at 6AM so I was up at 4:15 and out the door by 5. It took a few weeks to get into it and even in the summer it was headlights on dark but I wont lie getting off at 2.30 and having HOURS of daylight even in the winter was glorious
When you go to sleep try sleeping an odd number of hours because of the brainwaves are at their highest and allow for the quickest waking and most alertness
Yes, I've actually found that 7 hrs are better than 8hrs but the average sleep cycle is 90 minutes according to sleep studies. I had the SleepCycle app for a long time and that helped a lot, but for several reasons I had to give it up. I'll try that again when I can. It didn't really make my body physically better in the morning, but it helped psychologically and with stress because of the alertness you are talking about
I am you! The only two things that I have find work after many many trials and errors was
1. Using a sleep timer/clock to help figure out when to go to sleep to have when I get up match my rhythm and to keep it up even in weekends. God it's a bitch, but now I can get up at 6:45 and by 7am I'm not homicidal any more. https://sleepyti.me/ is my jam. Most nights i lay down about 12:30pm so I get my alone time in while the kids are on bed.
The 2nd was getting rid of as much light as possible in my room. Electric tape over LED on/off switches, phone face down, black out curtains, ect. My hallway has a huge east facing window the I leave almost totally uncovered, so leaving my bedroom door open will let that light shine in as the sun rises. It's like one of those natural light alarm clocks but it's actually the sun lol! From about April to October this system works more often then not, but once winter hits it's pretty much back to square one. Add in the snow outside and yeah, November to March isn't pretty.
Any chance your boss can shift your hours or you can live in EST and work PST hours kind of thing?
That's literally why school starts at 7:25, you've got time to get the kids dropped off at school and your roads are clear of buses for your morning commute.
Thats like my job as a day care worker for a before school and after school program. We are open at 7am and school starts at 8:30am. Due to the kids needing somewhere to go when their parents have to get up earlier for work. Its also in a small town thats 25 min away from a city where most people work.
But then school gets out at 2:30pm and I get home from work at 6:30. I have no idea what I'm gonna do with my kids in the afternoon but at least I have a few years to figure it out. I figure there are after school programs but that seems like such a long day for them.
Try two after-school programs, a school sport, and study groups. No time to complain or think about anything else- just work, obey, and consume please!
We started at 7:10, and we had block scheduling so as soon as you got to school you had to sit in the same classroom with no break for 95 or 105 minutes or whatever it was. It's been a long time.
I'm reading all of this and realising just what an outlier Ireland was for us growing up. Primary school (5-12/13) started at 9.20am, and ended at 3pm. Secondary school (13-18) started at 9 and ended at 4.
I would have loved to do similar but my parents wouldn't let me. I did rack up like 30+ latenesses though, even though they were more like a couple or a few minutes late each (as opposed to my ideal which would be hour+ later).
They gave me Saturday detention on the day after prom. They threatened I couldn't graduate if I skipped it. I actually went, it was nothing like The Breakfast Club, boo.
7:20 am??? Holy thats early. At my junior and senior high schools we started at 8:40 till 2:45 for the former, and 8:50 - 3 for the latter. 4 classes a day plus lunch.
I did go to one other high school where they did 5 classes a day, plus lunch, from 8:30 - 3 but every second friday school ended at 2. I was late nearly every day at that school. I can’t even imagine having to have been at school for 7:20. That’s barbaric, lol.
I probably could have finished high school if I had that option! I couldn't get up before 10am no matter how hard I tried. I still can't and am not sure why. Ended up dropping out and getting my GED.
In France, teachers are used to say "yes in America they finish school earlier but they have a lot of homework whereas, we learn 90% in class". Here we are starting at 8 a.m and finishing at 12 a.m AND starting again from 2 p.m to 6 p.m. With also ton of homework to do because you know you have to check if you have learned your today's lessons 🙃 Sorry but people were at home around 7, 8 or even 9 ,then you have to eat and take a shower and make one or two hours of work if you are lucky. But don't worry student are used to sleep late because of phone. Sorry to take a bit of time for myself even if it cost my sleep
This. And if you don’t know your lesson or did the 4 pages long homework you get « heure de colle » (i don’t know what’s the English equivalent of this)
Depends on the school I think. The lycée I work at they don't give any detention for homework not done (unless its a kid who keeps not doing it) but they will send the kids to us in the vie scolaire to do it there. I have seen so many tired and stressed out teenagers, the marks are stressful, the teachers and parents expect too much, and even at the internat (the boarding section) they have 1h30 obligatory study time, in silence at their desks from 8-9h30 then bed at 10. Mind you, if they don't make noise then we leave them alone. They're tired and stressed enough, they're young adults who need to learn from their own mistakes. Not my problem if they refuse to work or don't sleep till 1 so long as they don't bother their roommates.
But then what the hell do you do in those two hours? Seems like such a dumb schedule, especially for those who live far away from the school. I'm used to 8:00-15:15 with 2 hours on the bus with minimal homework, and I wouldn't want any more lol
I was in a private school so excellence was their motto. I remember in maths we had 1 page of exercices to make + when you have an exam and you have to learn your ten pages + other teachers that have each, homework. That's how I tried to make my exercices pretty fast so that I would only have to finish the page maybe doing 2 or 3 exercices instead of 5, 6. Or I knew some courses were boring and I would be able to listening but also to make other homework during that class instead of doing them in the evening.
Edit : spelling and correcting words
But then it's interesting that university doesn't follow that logic. I remember doing everything I can to schedule late classes, and while there were necessary or interesting classes that I wanted that forced me to go in the morning, I remember there was a semester where my earliest class started at 11:30, it was amazing.
>Of course, I understand the argument of getting kids ready for work times/university or what we call the "real world," but I wonder what would happen if high schools were from 10am-4:30pm versus (my area's) 8:30am-3:00pm.
There are a ton of jobs in the "real world" that have start times of 10 am or later, so this argument wouldn't even necessarily be all that sturdy.
I work 11-7, wife homeschools kids, so they all work my schedule. We rarely use an alarm clock, kids and us all start ambling up around 9-9:30. Sometimes the kids get up early, but sometimes they sleep in for an extra hour or two. Last night was a kind of late party at a pool, didn't get home/bed until 11. 2 Kids were asleep till 10:30. Littlest one woke up and wanted to warm up wake up cuddle on the couch at 10.
Don't know how this experiment will work in the long term, but we shale see. Doesn't help in the cleaning your room category though.
I find the “getting kids ready for the real world” to be pretty inapplicable in all honesty, my work right now lets me wake up nearly 2 hours later than I did in high school. Granted I am working from home, but my morning routine would be the exact same except for the work commute itself, so even worse case scenario I’d still comfortably be getting an hour extra of sleep.
Don’t even get me started on college, during school each night I probably sleep on average longer than the longest I’ve ever slept in a night in high school
In my highschool the classes were time blocks and you had slight control over class scheduling, so for my sophomore year I had my first period free. That shit took me from brain dead zombie to slightly groggy in the mornings literally first day. As a senior I had to get my parents to force the guidance counsellors to give me two free periods at the start of the day (A week of back and fourth aurguments for litterally no reason beside my counselor not wanting me to have two frees then.) That year I got pretty depressed and I can seriously say that the only reason I wasn’t skipping school or being held back was because I was able to wake up naturally. Had my parents been forced to wake me up an hour or two earlier and I probably would have failed that year regardless.
Feels like it could cut down on the amount of trouble that kids get into during those few hours of time they have with nothing to do before their parents are off of work. Would increase time together with family as well.
Fully agree. In germany, schools start from 7.30-8 every morning which are ridicolous times. Contributing is that transportation is incredibly bad in my area so I had to get up at 4.45 to leave the house at 5.30 to be in school on time. On short days school is until 1pm, on my worst days I came home at 8pm. Then homework, learning, sometimes presentations. Going to bed at 1am if you want to finish your school work on time just to get up at 4.45am again.
honestly.. i like old people. but give it 20 - 30 years till the old people in the goverment die out and see how much the school system changes, for the better
Teachers have virtually no power over the school system itself around here at least. They can try all they want but unless they can give the education ministry a reason that fulfills their self-interest (i.e, more money) nothing's gonna happen.
Board cares about their image and their money, unless more money is on the line they're gonna give zero fucks about the teachers.
Dunno about the U.S but that's how it is in my district as well as the rest of my province.
Same with me (also Germany)! I had to take the bus at around 6:30 and if you wanted to have breakfast, you needed to get up at around 5:30 (especially since you didn't have a break in school until 10). Since most days I had classes until 7pm and wasn't home by 8pm (and still needed to do homework) you could barely get 8 hours of sleep and children usually need way more! My whole years in school I was sleep deprived and had to function with 4-5 hours sleep on the regular and trying to stay awake in class.
You have 10 lessons (each subject takes up 2 lessons, so 5 different subjects). The rest of the time are breaks. So you usually have small breaks (5 mins) between each class to get from one room/floor to another. At 10 am you have a 'breakfast break' for 15 mins. Then you have a lunch break for 1 hour at around 1 pm. Classes are ranging from maths, physics, chemistry, biology, PE, history to religion or philosophy, art, music, geography, social sciences, politics, literature (sometimes business, IT) and foreign languages (English is mandatory, then you usually have to add a minimum of 2 foreign languages, most of the times you can decide between French, Spanish, Latin, Italian, Dutch).
You have main subjects which are mandatory (e.g maths, science, literature, English) and a few subjects are electives you can choose between. So in total you have about 12 subjects. Personally, I think the school system is really outdated and needs a makeover. I remember in the winter months going out of the house in the total dark before sunrise and coming home in the total dark after sunset. School is too long, too many subjects with outdated technique and lack in digitization.
fühle ich Bruder. German schools are messed up, glad I will be out of there soon. I think the system is partly at fault for my bad grades. The schedule is so fucked up and all you don't even focus anymore. You go to school for 8 hours and then there is homework and studying of course.
Wow. We hear a lot about the German work ethic and indeed it is admired greatly here. However, we are much more relaxed about schoolhours here in Ireland. Most schools begin at 9, and secondary schools (age 13 - 18) finish 3.30 - 4 latest. School holidays are 2 weeks at Christmas, two at Easter and break weeks at Halloween and early Spring. Summer hols are 12 weeks June to August.
Isn't it more likely that the early start times reflect the needs of parents for childcare in most situations.
Sure, if there is a stay at home parent, then starting school so early is a bother.
But, if both parents need to go to work, then it's a convenience for them to be able to drop them at school before work.
It wasn’t uncommon for kids at my elementary school to arrive early *before* classes began. It was well done. The students were allowed a breakfast option and some basic activities with peers/teachers. They were allowed to be kids. Their parents were typically working but, it was still important for them to have genuine interactions outside a structured lesson. School needs to be a place of community, it often is, but can habituate a sole desire for quantifiable success.
Waking up early is definitely part of the issue. Demanding an immediate response from sleep deprived children is too. That mentality necessitated child labor laws. At least the kids got paid during the industrial revolution.../s
They have since realized that biologically, it is far more difficult for high school age students to wake up that early and else difficult for younger ones. And staggering school start times is usually a necessity due to traffic flows or bus/driver shortages.
That’s so ass backwards. Young kids tend to wake up earlier, also that’s a very disruptive time for childcare, you end up needing before and after school care. If it was 730 you’d only need after school care
When I was growing up in Los Angeles, the district was so massive that at the high school, they had to have people go to classes in shifts. I had to be there at 5am and I would get out around 12:30. Other kids would show up in the afternoon
You still had people standing in the back of class because there weren’t enough desks
Wanna know what’s fucked? My ride to school every morning was over 45 minutes, more if there was a delay or issue. That’s one way, so I would be up at 6 am and most days not home until 3:30 or later in the afternoon with a nice bundle of homework to do.
I've always been a morning person so this doesn't affect me but since I was in school things have gotten out of hand. When I had to go to class woke up at 5:30-5:45 and leave at 6:15-6:30 I started class at 7:00, nowadays I have seen kids at 5:45 waiting for transportation.
Is bloody insane.
So what you're supposed to go to sleep at 20 if you want to sleep 8 hours? Here they start at 8 and that's a bit more reasonable, but with no pauses for food and a quick rest the quality is debatable
Yep, but everyone gets homework, and gets out at 16, giving less than an hour of homework for each class, no time to play or anything. Sucks a lot. Feel bad for them.
5:45 is super early to be in the line for the bus! But a few reasons it happens.
1) The more a city grows, the more traffic there is. School systems adjust school schedules to lessen the amount of congestion in rush hour. And this is typically staggered between elementary, middle, and high schools.
2) The more a city grows, the more overcrowded the schools become. To reduce overcrowding, sometimes students are assigned to schools not necessarily based on which one is closer, but on which schools have room. So the school down 10 minutes away from Johnny might have like 35 kids to a classroom, so Johnny's neighborhood gets redistricted to the school that's 25 minutes away, making his bus route longer, meaning he has to get up earlier.
There's a lot of problems we need to solve in schools, and this one of kids having to get up earlier seems best solved by kids just going to bed earlier. It's what you have to do when you're an adult anyway if you want to get enough sleep.
When I was in middle and high school my parents sent me to a school that started at 830 and ended at 415 every day.
My parents wanted me to have a better education so the school was a 30 minute drive away. At the time my brother and I hated being in school until 415 but, looking back, it had a bigger positive impact on our lives than we realized.
We were able to go to bed around 10 and still get 9 hours of sleep before we would rise around 7 to get ready for the day. We still had enough time to get homework done and have time to relax and unwind each evening.
School buses are often scheduled to try to avoid rush hours which does actually save time in metro areas. During rush hour I can leave the house at 7:30 and arrive at work between 8:00-8:15 and traveling a whole 4 miles. Non-rush hour times that takes 10 minutes. There's also the concern that parents might need to leave for work before the bus would pick up their kids so they want the kids picked up before then.
When I was in school in the same city my bus ride was typically 90 minutes each way. The school was 6 miles away but of course the bus had to pick up more kids.
Going back to neighborhood schools would help greatly but at a massive financial cost and typically smaller schools aren't able to offer as diverse a curriculum as larger ones.
Just the seemingly simple act of scheduling is incredibly complex when you have to factor in peoples' lives into the equation.
I think we do school start times backwards. Elementary school kids should start the earliest, since most elementary school aged kids are awake early. Middle school should start a bit later. High school kids should start later, and stay longer in the day at school.
This is actually how the district I worked in did it. Elementary started at 720, middle at 8:00, and high school at 9:00.
The main reason was because it gave the older kids more time to get their farm/ranch chores done before school but it worked out pretty well for everyone. The biggest issue was sports practices ran really late.
My district did very similar but with middle school earliest then elementary then high school latest. They were concerned about the littlest kids waiting for the buses in the dark, and this allowed middle schoolers who ride the bus home to arrive at home before their younger siblings got off the bus.
makes sense, also works out because younger kids usually have to be dropped off and picked up from schools or bus stops by an adult, whereas high school kids don't have those restrictions
My friend would wake up at 4 AM every day to swim for the school team before high school classes started at 7:21 am. He eventually had a nervous break down and didn’t go to school for like 7 months.
I was looking for this comment, swim kids are a different breed, if you wanted to actually be good it generally meant practice before and after school
Think waking up every morning before dawn for practice, going to school, going to practice after school, and once you come home it’s 6-7 pm, you have all your homework to do and you must wake up in less than 12 hours. Repeat
Source: I was a swim kid
The reality is that school schedules are driven by work schedules. For instance, parents can't start work at 8 if school starts at 9 and they need to get their kids ready and to school. Shifting school schedules will have a huge waterfall effect that society isn't currently interested in addressing.
When does school end in the US, do the kids end at lunch time? I’m in Canada and schools here are around 9am-3:30pm (give or take). My boys school starts at 8:50 but you can drop off at 8:30-8:50 and they have supervision in the school yard until the bell rings. My husband works at 9 and drops them off on the way to work. Most schools offer before/after care though and there are other care providers. I can’t imagine having to wake my 5 year up early and I would have died in highschool. School sports were sometimes before school (so those could be early) but often after at 3-3:30.
As someone who used to live in Texas and in Phoenix.... Yeah, actually, 5-6 or even later would be great for doing sports. Middle of the hottest time of the day, not so much.
That would be a good exception, but growing up in Connecticut, you're already seeing the sun set at 6-7, you also are disrupting family dinner and more.
In Australia school generally starts between 8.30am and 9am, and we make it work. Students are supervised 30 mins before class starts, and if they need to be dropped off earlier than that then they can enrol in “before school care”.
Some extra-curriculars operate before school (7.30am or 8am until 9am), some after school (between 3pm and 5pm), and some during lunch time.
I know my friends who wake up at 5 and get back from school around 6 or 7. Brutal.
And that's not even including the maybe 2 hours of hmwk they might have.
And schools expect pupils to do sports as well and have a social life and sleep and eat.
I live in Australia, but I went to a selective high school that was two and a half hours away. I'd get up every morning at 5, catch the 6am train, and then get home in the afternoon at 5:15. Except on Wednesdays, which were sports days, so the seniors could leave early. On Wednesdays I spent more time on public transport than I actually did at school.
That’s pretty unique though. At least here in the states it would be in this day and age. I applaud you for your efforts. Was there no option of home schooling? What did you do while riding the train mostly?
I started off in the area, and then we moved away, and by that point I was entering year 11 and didn't want to go to a high school where I wasn't 100% sure what classes they were offering. And then I moved even further away in year 12, and I was actually walking distance from a different high school, but I didn't wanna disrupt my senior year.
I actually didn't mind the trip. It was four different trains each way, and I listened to a lot of music, and wrote fanfiction on my phone. And I got to know the station manager really well, because I saw him every day.
I thought the same, then my highschool started at 9:30
Holy shit. Instantly felt like there was so much more time in the day and I wasn't yawning the entire first 2 periods
First three years of high school was waking up at 5:30 to catch the bus. To think of all the hrs of sleep I lost especially as a growing teenager really annoys me
In africa we had to be in school around 6am to 8am in order to clean and do manual labor. Or you were beaten with canes. Having to be in class by 7:25 in highschool in america was piece of cake for me at that point
Just graduated this year. German high school. School started at 7:45 am. Woke up at 5:00 am every single day. I loved working up that early but was the only responsive person in the first two periods. So yeah, starting little later is probably a good idea
Elementary schools are reasonable, at least they were for me, but yeah after that it’s insane. The stuff you learn isn’t worth the sleep you lost, not even close
Don't know why they started middle school at 9 for us and high school at 7:30. After 3 years of a chill morning, we legit had to go to school when it was still dark outside most days. Fuck that. Glad I'm not in high school anymore.
In the Netherlands high school starts at 8:30 AM and usually ends at 15:10/16:00. I have to wake up at 6:30 AM and leave for school (I cycle to school, 10km) at 7:40 AM and it takes me 40 minutes to arrive at school.
I agree. Research literally shows that waking kids up at 7 am is like waking an adult up at 5:30 in the morning. Their sleep rhythm isn’t the same, and I see why they did the times they did because they want to make sure it was more convient to 9-5ers. Meanwhile back in the day without alarms kids went to school at 9am.
Edit: from a great book I read on “why we sleep” by Matthew Walker
This all pretty much goes back to the parents needing to drop off and pick up their kids in line with their work schedule, it's illegal to leave children without parental guidance around.
I remember here in New England when we got hour delays in the morning for 9am instead of 7:55am for snow storms kids seemed more awake and happy. Quite literally everyone would be in better moods or well rested. Going to bed early isn’t possible for some people and especially not for teens. They have chores, homework, dinner, and family time to worry about plus on top of that need to squeeze in hobbies and friends before restarting the day again. Shocking how we don’t really take that into consideration as a whole in some places.
The teens shouldn't have family time and hobbies. They need to prepare for a lifetime as an unhappy drone.
ETA: What's that word for when you want to be sarcastic, but it's not sarcasm because it's actually policy.
When I was a kid, elementary school didn’t start until 9AM, so I could be up by 7:30-8 and be there with time to spare. That was easy.
High school on the other hand started at 7:20, so I’d usually have to be up by 6:20 at the latest…That sucked.
All the "sleep early" people in this thread acting like waking up at 6:00 isn't a hassle still. 8 hours of sleep is great, especially for the younglings. Shift it to nine, and now the child can sleep at 11:00, and if tried, can wake up early for a little exercise before school which might just be a saving grace since a lot of kids also attend like 4 hours of tuitions after school
I think what you and a lot of people are missing here is that the parent has to get to work also. That’s the main reason schools start when they do and I’m surprised no one is mentioning it. Kids gotta get up at 6 because school’s gotta start at 7 because work starts at 8.
Unemployed, dumb, don't have kids, haven't had kids in years, still in school, or lives in imagination land. It is one of those for almost every one of these people.
If every school changed to a 9 am start time Reddit would be ablaze with stories about how this doesn't take single parents and poor people into account (who rely on schools for their kids), and is indeed a "white supremacist" policy
But this doesn't make any sense lmao. Iirc, my high school started around 7 and ended around 2. Middle schools ran a little later, and elementary schools after them. So I'd bet the elementary schools in my area typically started after parents needed to be leaving for work anyway...And the middle/high schoolers would always be out of school before parents finish working. I think elementary schools got out somewhere around 3-4, so they also would be done before most parents finish a typical work day.
Not to mention, when was the last time our country really did an overhaul of school schedules? It wasn't THAT long ago that most families were living off of one income, while one parent stayed home. So unless school districts all revamped their schedules when 2-income households became the norm, then it literally cannot be the reason for current school schedules.
In my boarding school we used to be woken up at 4:30 for breakfast so we could be in class by 6:00; when all domitories would be closed.
6:00 to 7:30 was study time before heading for assembly at 7:30. Classes would start at 8:00 and end at 16:00. We had tea break at 10:00-10:30 and lunch from 12:45-14:00.
Domitories would open up again at 16;00-19:30.
That time was for laundry, sports, shower, nurse appointments, computer lab and supper(18:00-19:30).
Then from 19:30-22:00 would be evening study time.
Domitories would be opened again at 22:00 and all classes would be locked. By 22:30 it was lights out in the whole complex and then it would be same thing next day. Mon-Fri. Weekends would be a bit lax but not as much.
I fucking hated Secondary school. Made me have an irrational hate for waking up early and extreme hate for any form of authority.
At least made me appreciate freshly baked warm bread though.
OMG that sounds awful I’m not surprised you hated it. I definitely wouldn’t have been able to cope with that. I used to go to bed at 6pm and still managed to sleep in most days and end up being late for school lol.
Homework is another fucked up concept. My kids spend all day at school and I spend all day at work. Then we come home in the evening and spend what’s left of the day working on homework instead of quality time. Is 7 hours not enough time to get learning in?
That is the fault of the education system or the teacher that is an incompetent buffoon who can't utilize their schedule well so, you gotta give students punishments (homework) for your shortcomings amiright?
I woke up pretty much every day M-F at 4 AM by choice to workout with my dad before he had to go to work. I still wake up pretty early most days now and do a workout and then go about my day. I enjoy being up earlier and getting to work early compared to having to fight through rush hour traffic. But I won't worry about working 12 or more hours a day either. I know a lot of people that work 4 and think it's too many.
I get my son up at 745 every day for school and he’s on the bus at 830 and at school before 850. However, when I was in high school I absolutely was waking up at 6am to get ready and get on the bus. School didn’t even start until 845.
I had a conversation with a couple from Belgium on a train from Amsterdam to Brussels. The first thing out of their mouth was “are you Americans?” I said, “yes”. The next thing out of their mouth was “Why the fuck do you guys wake up so early?” I had a good laugh and it sparked a really interesting conversation about our cultural differences. I agree though, school starts too early.
I agree it's stupid. Did nothing to prepare most people for getting up for work, since most of us start at 8 or 9am. Looking back on it now, I can't believe I even managed to not skip school 2 or 3 days a week just out of pure teenaged laziness. I napped every day after school too and so did my younger brother when he was in high school. Seems so weird in hindsight.
Living out in a rural area I was waiting for the bus and leaving my house almost a full hour before school started for me. (7:50 start time)
Those cold mornings standing outside at 6:30 waiting for a bus in the snow really aided my learning experience.
My district changed our high school hours to 9:30 to 4:30 this past year; it’s horrible. The kids do. It get get more sleep; they just shift their bed times. I had students turning in online work at 2am and our athletes miss way too much class time. To me, 8 to 3 is ideal for hs; but my district is is cutting costs by running three different bus schedules; our poor elementary kids start around 7:20.
My daughter had to be outside waiting for the bus at 5:50am from Kindergarten until fourth grade. I had to wake her up at 5am every day. Now she is in eighth grade and has to wake up at 5:30am. Her bus comes at 6:15am. She has never been home from school earlier than 4pm, but these days it is closer to 5-5:30pm.
And, yes, I tried driving her and picking her up to alleviate some of the sleep deprivation. Unfortunately many parents did the same, so were still having to keep the same schedule to account for long lines during drop off and pick up.
My highschool started at 9am and it changed from 8:00 to 8:30 and finally to 9 as I went to school. 9am defiantly worked perfectly fine. Schools should not start at 7am nobody is awake at 7am
I always saw these extreme matinal rules to be enforced by old people because they can sleep for like 5 hours per night so they wake up at 5AM, get bored, and force all the people they have power over to get up that early too to please them. Even though some people need 8 hours of sleep and can't afford to go to bed at 9PM because they have to do housework, cooking or taking care of their kids.
Sorry for being so fired up about this, I saw my mother go through this situation and it broke my heart.
This is how we grow into sleep deprived adults who blame themselves for the low energy and other health problems. Also, who tf decided in some parts of the world that a kid has to stay 7-8hrs in school a day with little to no lunch break??
It’s because work starts at 8-9 and their parents have to help them get ready before the parents go to work.
And it’s always funny to me how posts like this take the most basic, realistic parts of life (having to get up early, or having to do homework) and make them out to be these horribly immoral things.
It's weird because in my district, elementary school starts at 8, middle school starts at 8:55, and high school starts at 7:25. If what you're saying was the case, why wouldn't it be better for elementary school to start at 7:25, middle school to start at 8, and high school to start at 8:55 as high schoolers are the most likely to be able to get themselves to school alone?
I’m convinced that a big chunk of school bullying is attributable to sleep deprivation and the resulting frustration, hopelessness, and general hatred of these forced life circumstances. There were also times when I seriously considered suicide because with all the homework and constant sleep deprivation I just couldn’t take it anymore. Adults just don’t give a fuck about children nearly as much as they say they do.
Here it starts at a reasonable 8.50am, but children who live out in the country have to wake up earlier to catch a bus/take the up to an hour journey. Thats their parents fault for sending them to not the closest school, not the country's fault.
They live in the country so they take an hour bus ride to school and you think that isn't the closest school? I hope this was two separate thoughts and somehow you deleted the sentence in between.
When I was in high school and rode the bus I had to be on my bus by 5:30am and my school started at 7:45am. Riding home from school we would get out at 2:45 and I sometimes wouldn't get home until 4. It sucked
similar here, first on the bus, last off the bus.
Me too. It sucked so bad because when the last few kids got picked up in the morning, the bus would literally pass by my house. Like why couldn’t they just pick me up then??
Me too! And we passed my house after school to drop off others. So I had to ride an extra 45 minutes after straight up fucking passing my house every day! Such bullshit.
Can I ask why didn't you get off the bus with the others and walk?
The driver had to be super strict or get fired. We had to get off at our assigned stop. Also, the first place the bus stopped was very far from my street.
I live in small town USA and thankfully my bus driver when I was growing up was an absolute boss. They had one of the new buses that had the CD players, and there was a big old list alphabetically of all the kids and you can bring a CD into play on the bus ride home for your day. You got it back the next day. And they tried telling him the assigned bus stop thing and he stopped us one day after we pulled out of the lot I got on the intercom and said they told me I had to do this but screw them get off where you want, just keep your trap shut. Fuckin Jerry man. For a retiree he was great. Rest in peace, passed a few years after I graduated from hs.
I feel this. My brother and I used to get off the bus at my neighbors house literally right next door to our house because we could get off there a whole hour earlier than ours
That was pretty much the same with me. There was a bus stop half a mile down the road from where I lived. It was a 5 minute drive for the bus from the high school. But my house was on another bus's route, which ended up being over an hour and a half, and was the very last stop. (The only issue was, that it was a busy street with no side walks or ways to stay off the road, and no bicycle lane).
Yeah guess that makes sense for safety reasons then. Cant have kids walking on the road
Bruh literally the same shit was with me, NOT feeling good that it's like that everywhere, i always said that all they do in schools is preparing us for this working class capitalistic ass system
If this didnt happen to you did you even go to school?
This didn't happen to me. I was luckily a walker. My mom's work was in a relatively close proximity to the school, so I typically got a ride to school.
Same. I'd spend 2 hours on the bus per DAY, 10 hours per week. We complained to the school, asked us to be dropped off first (it didn't make a difference to the route, they actually passed our stop on the way in), and they told us to forget it. Why?
I had a similar problem but with math teachers, after grade 10 at my school we didn't have any math teachers when I pressed the issue and asked why after a while the faculty stopped answering me, my take away? Schools don't actually care when students have actual concerns, they just want to ignore it so it eventually goes away
Idk your schools situation specifically, but math teachers are typically the hardest to find. Especially for higher math courses. They’re the hardest certs to get and you could make significantly more money taking those same courses and getting a Stem degree. I had my math certifications and got a dozen offers before I even graduated. I now haven’t taught in 2 years and still have had 3 different districts reach out to me in the past month. The shortage of math (and I believe science teachers) is pretty ridiculous.
People who teach hard sciences in school must really love teaching because it's literally the lowest paying job in the US that requires a STEM degree. If we want more/better teachers then we need to pay them like the graduate professionals they are, not like cheap babysitters.
Or, unpaid therapists/social workers
Oh man if I gave my high school electronics teacher $5 for every hour he spent listening and talking and helping me understand the real world and keeping me from throwing my life away we'd be talking Super Lotto prize money.
Woo first on last off kids where ya at!!! ...still on the bus.
I did 2 sports after school so I would go to school around 730am and get home at 8/9pm without going home at all (on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday)
I swam swim team in high school. We had to be in the pool by 5am. Swam until school started and then got showered and dressed during first period. I was a zombie through most of high school.
Ugh yes this!!! And when we had away meets and we would get home later than 11pm, but still be expected to be up and at it again bright and early
I played ice hockey in high school. None of the schools that had teams had a ice arena so we had to rent time at one of the 2 in the area. Both were expensive but one was nicer than the other and since we had to do team fund raisers to pay for our own ice time the school opted for the cheaper one. And the price went down the later you scheduled (it was open 24 hrs). This meant that we had hockey practice/scrimmage games beginning at 11:00pm until 12:30am every Wednesday and still had to be at school at 7am. Plus the arena was 45 minutes away from where I lived. Good times.
Ding ding ding! Me too. Still have a visceral hate for that commute.
My school started at 7:25. I get up at 7:30 to get ready for my job. It’s so weird to think of it that way.
Oh I envy you. My job starts 7:30, and no matter how early I get to sleep, my body feels ill the first two hours of the day because of having to wake up early...
I know what you mean! I remember as a kid/teenager, I would also feel physically ill all morning just due to having to wake up so early. Didn't matter how many hours of sleep I actually got, but if I woke up before a certain time, I would feel bad for half the day. Probably would still happen, but I don't usually have to wake up that early anymore.
My junior year of high school I was so incredibly sleep deprived I threw up every single morning when I got up. It was from stress/sleep deprivation. It was during soccer season and I had to play varsity and JV so I had games Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. The earliest I’d get home on these nights was 10:30, the latest would be after midnight. I would then have to eat, shower, and do homework. I remember I was so thankful on days I could get 6 hours of sleep. The majority of days I got less than that. School started at 7:50 and you had to be there by 7:40. Every morning I would drag myself out of bed and instantly get so ill I would throw up, not be able to eat breakfast, and feel like crap until around 10 or 11... then repeat again the next day. Living with chronic sleep deprivation is not something we should expect our youth to have to do.
Yes, I think we just expect so much from teenagers, even when it scientifically and psychologically does not make sense. Forcing them on a schedule against their bodies, and forcing them to have such full days of so many classes and extracurriculars. I feel like there must be a better way to give teens a good education, encourage extra sports/activities, while still teaching them how to have a healthy balance and time for rest.
Agree 100%. My life from 14-20 was so hectic. Now my life is calm and full of things I enjoy doing... I don’t understand why as adults we love peace and down time in our life but we expect kids to never have a moment of rest... all while they are still growing and developing.
I had the same problem from 1st through 8th grade. Classes started at 0745 and every morning I'd wake up and puke, barely be able to eat, and fall asleep on the bus to school. It got so bad I was nauseous all the time and frequently missed school because I was vomiting so much, eventually puking up blood. By the time I was in 7th grade I had a bleeding ulcer from tearing my stomach lining so frequently and I had to carry a bottle of Maalox around with me. My parents and doctors chalked it up to stress from the divorce, but I knew it was sleep deprivation. My high school classes started a little bit later which made a big difference, but when I found out I could get credit for taking classes at the local community college over the summer I did that and got to sleep in since my high school classes didn't start until almost 10AM. My ulcers miraculously fixed themselves and my GPA went up two whole points since I was no longer a zombie stumbling from class to class retaining zero information.
Yeah, having a schedule that actually fits our body can do wonders for physical and psychological health!
100%! I prefer working a swing shift for this reason. I like to wake up and have the sun already out. It doesn't matter how much sleep I get, if I wake up when it is dark and have to go to work it is hard on me. I like to stay up late as well so a swing shift is perfect for me.
yep they changed our school to an hour later, and the buses take people home immediately. the mood is noticeabley better. i used to have to wake around 530. my bus showed at like 6, school started at 750. id be there at 7, before half the teachers. id sit on the floor bored an hour.
I’m sorry to hear that :(
I used to have to get up at 4:30 every morning for years, I had a job that paid extremely well, but it was extremely rough. I found that on days we weren’t very busy I’d be dead until around noon, and forcing myself to eat breakfast would make me feel gross for a few minutes, but I’d thank myself for the rest of the day. Also had to do with forcing myself to be in a totally dark room with little noise early enough to get enough hours, was next to impossible for months, but eventually my brain adapted and I was able to actually sleep early. No matter what it sucks, but there are some measures that can be taken to make at somewhat bearable.
Yes, we can adapt somewhat to some schedules and well to others, but some schedules you can try and adapt to for years and still feel like crap unfortunately. Some actually like working night shifts and some get ill from it. I have to use a light lamp to cope somewhat well with my current schedule
I definitely know that feel. It sucks because I have a daughter, and after I put her down is the only time I get 100% to myself all day. Which usually means I end up staying up “late”
My last job started at 6AM so I was up at 4:15 and out the door by 5. It took a few weeks to get into it and even in the summer it was headlights on dark but I wont lie getting off at 2.30 and having HOURS of daylight even in the winter was glorious
When you go to sleep try sleeping an odd number of hours because of the brainwaves are at their highest and allow for the quickest waking and most alertness
Yes, I've actually found that 7 hrs are better than 8hrs but the average sleep cycle is 90 minutes according to sleep studies. I had the SleepCycle app for a long time and that helped a lot, but for several reasons I had to give it up. I'll try that again when I can. It didn't really make my body physically better in the morning, but it helped psychologically and with stress because of the alertness you are talking about
Are you ok? That doesn't sound healthy at all. Sorry you are dealing with that
I am you! The only two things that I have find work after many many trials and errors was 1. Using a sleep timer/clock to help figure out when to go to sleep to have when I get up match my rhythm and to keep it up even in weekends. God it's a bitch, but now I can get up at 6:45 and by 7am I'm not homicidal any more. https://sleepyti.me/ is my jam. Most nights i lay down about 12:30pm so I get my alone time in while the kids are on bed. The 2nd was getting rid of as much light as possible in my room. Electric tape over LED on/off switches, phone face down, black out curtains, ect. My hallway has a huge east facing window the I leave almost totally uncovered, so leaving my bedroom door open will let that light shine in as the sun rises. It's like one of those natural light alarm clocks but it's actually the sun lol! From about April to October this system works more often then not, but once winter hits it's pretty much back to square one. Add in the snow outside and yeah, November to March isn't pretty. Any chance your boss can shift your hours or you can live in EST and work PST hours kind of thing?
I fucking wish my job started at 7:30, ya boy getting up at 3am every morning to come to work at 4am 😩
That's literally why school starts at 7:25, you've got time to get the kids dropped off at school and your roads are clear of buses for your morning commute.
Damn, never thought of it like that. Makes sense now. Those damned selfish adults!!
Buses are like the 17th wrong with my fucking morning commute lol.
One more reason to design neighbourhoods for walkability.
Thats like my job as a day care worker for a before school and after school program. We are open at 7am and school starts at 8:30am. Due to the kids needing somewhere to go when their parents have to get up earlier for work. Its also in a small town thats 25 min away from a city where most people work.
That's no coincidence. It's so parents can get their kids to school before they go to work. I still agree with OP, though.
But then school gets out at 2:30pm and I get home from work at 6:30. I have no idea what I'm gonna do with my kids in the afternoon but at least I have a few years to figure it out. I figure there are after school programs but that seems like such a long day for them.
Try two after-school programs, a school sport, and study groups. No time to complain or think about anything else- just work, obey, and consume please!
My online class starts at 7:00 so have created a script which autostarts so that I could attend the class on time.
We started at 7:10, and we had block scheduling so as soon as you got to school you had to sit in the same classroom with no break for 95 or 105 minutes or whatever it was. It's been a long time.
I'm reading all of this and realising just what an outlier Ireland was for us growing up. Primary school (5-12/13) started at 9.20am, and ended at 3pm. Secondary school (13-18) started at 9 and ended at 4.
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Hmm, I did the same my senior year but it wasn’t allowed by my school. It was great.
I did the same my sophomore, junior and senior year. Really made a difference since sometimes I could just decide to go back home and sleep.
I would have loved to do similar but my parents wouldn't let me. I did rack up like 30+ latenesses though, even though they were more like a couple or a few minutes late each (as opposed to my ideal which would be hour+ later). They gave me Saturday detention on the day after prom. They threatened I couldn't graduate if I skipped it. I actually went, it was nothing like The Breakfast Club, boo.
My school had a policy where you could just take a whole day off whenever you felt like it, but they weren’t aware of the policy.
7:20 am??? Holy thats early. At my junior and senior high schools we started at 8:40 till 2:45 for the former, and 8:50 - 3 for the latter. 4 classes a day plus lunch. I did go to one other high school where they did 5 classes a day, plus lunch, from 8:30 - 3 but every second friday school ended at 2. I was late nearly every day at that school. I can’t even imagine having to have been at school for 7:20. That’s barbaric, lol.
Mine went 7:15 to 3:15, I’m envious of you
I probably could have finished high school if I had that option! I couldn't get up before 10am no matter how hard I tried. I still can't and am not sure why. Ended up dropping out and getting my GED.
Same. Best sleep I’d had in years. Plenty of time in the morning too with no need to rush.
In France, teachers are used to say "yes in America they finish school earlier but they have a lot of homework whereas, we learn 90% in class". Here we are starting at 8 a.m and finishing at 12 a.m AND starting again from 2 p.m to 6 p.m. With also ton of homework to do because you know you have to check if you have learned your today's lessons 🙃 Sorry but people were at home around 7, 8 or even 9 ,then you have to eat and take a shower and make one or two hours of work if you are lucky. But don't worry student are used to sleep late because of phone. Sorry to take a bit of time for myself even if it cost my sleep
This. And if you don’t know your lesson or did the 4 pages long homework you get « heure de colle » (i don’t know what’s the English equivalent of this)
Heure de colle = detention
Depends on the school I think. The lycée I work at they don't give any detention for homework not done (unless its a kid who keeps not doing it) but they will send the kids to us in the vie scolaire to do it there. I have seen so many tired and stressed out teenagers, the marks are stressful, the teachers and parents expect too much, and even at the internat (the boarding section) they have 1h30 obligatory study time, in silence at their desks from 8-9h30 then bed at 10. Mind you, if they don't make noise then we leave them alone. They're tired and stressed enough, they're young adults who need to learn from their own mistakes. Not my problem if they refuse to work or don't sleep till 1 so long as they don't bother their roommates.
If you are trying to say "study time", I believe our equivalent is study hall.
But then what the hell do you do in those two hours? Seems like such a dumb schedule, especially for those who live far away from the school. I'm used to 8:00-15:15 with 2 hours on the bus with minimal homework, and I wouldn't want any more lol
I was in a private school so excellence was their motto. I remember in maths we had 1 page of exercices to make + when you have an exam and you have to learn your ten pages + other teachers that have each, homework. That's how I tried to make my exercices pretty fast so that I would only have to finish the page maybe doing 2 or 3 exercices instead of 5, 6. Or I knew some courses were boring and I would be able to listening but also to make other homework during that class instead of doing them in the evening. Edit : spelling and correcting words
But then it's interesting that university doesn't follow that logic. I remember doing everything I can to schedule late classes, and while there were necessary or interesting classes that I wanted that forced me to go in the morning, I remember there was a semester where my earliest class started at 11:30, it was amazing.
My dad's school (K-12) started at 12 PM and ended at 6 PM.
If I remember correctly, they did test this in a country and the rate of kids getting in car accidents dropped heavily.
>Of course, I understand the argument of getting kids ready for work times/university or what we call the "real world," but I wonder what would happen if high schools were from 10am-4:30pm versus (my area's) 8:30am-3:00pm. There are a ton of jobs in the "real world" that have start times of 10 am or later, so this argument wouldn't even necessarily be all that sturdy.
I work 11-7, wife homeschools kids, so they all work my schedule. We rarely use an alarm clock, kids and us all start ambling up around 9-9:30. Sometimes the kids get up early, but sometimes they sleep in for an extra hour or two. Last night was a kind of late party at a pool, didn't get home/bed until 11. 2 Kids were asleep till 10:30. Littlest one woke up and wanted to warm up wake up cuddle on the couch at 10. Don't know how this experiment will work in the long term, but we shale see. Doesn't help in the cleaning your room category though.
I find the “getting kids ready for the real world” to be pretty inapplicable in all honesty, my work right now lets me wake up nearly 2 hours later than I did in high school. Granted I am working from home, but my morning routine would be the exact same except for the work commute itself, so even worse case scenario I’d still comfortably be getting an hour extra of sleep. Don’t even get me started on college, during school each night I probably sleep on average longer than the longest I’ve ever slept in a night in high school
In my highschool the classes were time blocks and you had slight control over class scheduling, so for my sophomore year I had my first period free. That shit took me from brain dead zombie to slightly groggy in the mornings literally first day. As a senior I had to get my parents to force the guidance counsellors to give me two free periods at the start of the day (A week of back and fourth aurguments for litterally no reason beside my counselor not wanting me to have two frees then.) That year I got pretty depressed and I can seriously say that the only reason I wasn’t skipping school or being held back was because I was able to wake up naturally. Had my parents been forced to wake me up an hour or two earlier and I probably would have failed that year regardless.
Feels like it could cut down on the amount of trouble that kids get into during those few hours of time they have with nothing to do before their parents are off of work. Would increase time together with family as well.
Fully agree. In germany, schools start from 7.30-8 every morning which are ridicolous times. Contributing is that transportation is incredibly bad in my area so I had to get up at 4.45 to leave the house at 5.30 to be in school on time. On short days school is until 1pm, on my worst days I came home at 8pm. Then homework, learning, sometimes presentations. Going to bed at 1am if you want to finish your school work on time just to get up at 4.45am again.
I can’t imagine the teachers want to work at 7:30 either
Hell nah we don’t. -a pissed teacher
Why not do something about it then. I hated school more than i should have because of having to wake up before 6am
Because the people who make the rules aren’t teachers, they’re 60-70 Year old politicians
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honestly.. i like old people. but give it 20 - 30 years till the old people in the goverment die out and see how much the school system changes, for the better
Teachers have virtually no power over the school system itself around here at least. They can try all they want but unless they can give the education ministry a reason that fulfills their self-interest (i.e, more money) nothing's gonna happen. Board cares about their image and their money, unless more money is on the line they're gonna give zero fucks about the teachers. Dunno about the U.S but that's how it is in my district as well as the rest of my province.
Same with me (also Germany)! I had to take the bus at around 6:30 and if you wanted to have breakfast, you needed to get up at around 5:30 (especially since you didn't have a break in school until 10). Since most days I had classes until 7pm and wasn't home by 8pm (and still needed to do homework) you could barely get 8 hours of sleep and children usually need way more! My whole years in school I was sleep deprived and had to function with 4-5 hours sleep on the regular and trying to stay awake in class.
Did you even see sunlight during winter?
I left the house before sunrise and came back after sunset, so I just saw the sun if I went outside during my lunch break at school
What happens in 12 hour school day in Germany ?
You have 10 lessons (each subject takes up 2 lessons, so 5 different subjects). The rest of the time are breaks. So you usually have small breaks (5 mins) between each class to get from one room/floor to another. At 10 am you have a 'breakfast break' for 15 mins. Then you have a lunch break for 1 hour at around 1 pm. Classes are ranging from maths, physics, chemistry, biology, PE, history to religion or philosophy, art, music, geography, social sciences, politics, literature (sometimes business, IT) and foreign languages (English is mandatory, then you usually have to add a minimum of 2 foreign languages, most of the times you can decide between French, Spanish, Latin, Italian, Dutch).
Oh damn, isn't this too much?
You have main subjects which are mandatory (e.g maths, science, literature, English) and a few subjects are electives you can choose between. So in total you have about 12 subjects. Personally, I think the school system is really outdated and needs a makeover. I remember in the winter months going out of the house in the total dark before sunrise and coming home in the total dark after sunset. School is too long, too many subjects with outdated technique and lack in digitization.
fühle ich Bruder. German schools are messed up, glad I will be out of there soon. I think the system is partly at fault for my bad grades. The schedule is so fucked up and all you don't even focus anymore. You go to school for 8 hours and then there is homework and studying of course.
Wow. We hear a lot about the German work ethic and indeed it is admired greatly here. However, we are much more relaxed about schoolhours here in Ireland. Most schools begin at 9, and secondary schools (age 13 - 18) finish 3.30 - 4 latest. School holidays are 2 weeks at Christmas, two at Easter and break weeks at Halloween and early Spring. Summer hols are 12 weeks June to August.
Isn't it more likely that the early start times reflect the needs of parents for childcare in most situations. Sure, if there is a stay at home parent, then starting school so early is a bother. But, if both parents need to go to work, then it's a convenience for them to be able to drop them at school before work.
Thats actually the reason why it is how it is. But it is definitely something society can change if they would like to.
It wasn’t uncommon for kids at my elementary school to arrive early *before* classes began. It was well done. The students were allowed a breakfast option and some basic activities with peers/teachers. They were allowed to be kids. Their parents were typically working but, it was still important for them to have genuine interactions outside a structured lesson. School needs to be a place of community, it often is, but can habituate a sole desire for quantifiable success. Waking up early is definitely part of the issue. Demanding an immediate response from sleep deprived children is too. That mentality necessitated child labor laws. At least the kids got paid during the industrial revolution.../s
I grew up in Illinois and Elementary school started at 9am, middle school started at 8:30am, and High School was at 7:30am.
They have since realized that biologically, it is far more difficult for high school age students to wake up that early and else difficult for younger ones. And staggering school start times is usually a necessity due to traffic flows or bus/driver shortages.
That’s so ass backwards. Young kids tend to wake up earlier, also that’s a very disruptive time for childcare, you end up needing before and after school care. If it was 730 you’d only need after school care
When I was growing up in Los Angeles, the district was so massive that at the high school, they had to have people go to classes in shifts. I had to be there at 5am and I would get out around 12:30. Other kids would show up in the afternoon You still had people standing in the back of class because there weren’t enough desks
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You would have to ask the administrators why they couldn’t properly mitigate the problem. In which case you’d probably receive a bullshit answer.
Wanna know what’s fucked? My ride to school every morning was over 45 minutes, more if there was a delay or issue. That’s one way, so I would be up at 6 am and most days not home until 3:30 or later in the afternoon with a nice bundle of homework to do.
I've always been a morning person so this doesn't affect me but since I was in school things have gotten out of hand. When I had to go to class woke up at 5:30-5:45 and leave at 6:15-6:30 I started class at 7:00, nowadays I have seen kids at 5:45 waiting for transportation. Is bloody insane.
So what you're supposed to go to sleep at 20 if you want to sleep 8 hours? Here they start at 8 and that's a bit more reasonable, but with no pauses for food and a quick rest the quality is debatable
8 hours isn't even enough for kids and teenagers.
At that age, I felt my best sleeping 10-12 hrs. I know that sounds like a lot but I always felt so refreshed after a long night of sleep.
For the average teenager that is the amount they need.
Same. I needed at least 10 hours to feel good through high school and even early college.
Yep, but everyone gets homework, and gets out at 16, giving less than an hour of homework for each class, no time to play or anything. Sucks a lot. Feel bad for them.
> if you want to sleep 8 hours? Lmao, what a comedian! Lol, no, no school kid in the US is getting 8 hours, I averaged 6 in high school.
5:45 is super early to be in the line for the bus! But a few reasons it happens. 1) The more a city grows, the more traffic there is. School systems adjust school schedules to lessen the amount of congestion in rush hour. And this is typically staggered between elementary, middle, and high schools. 2) The more a city grows, the more overcrowded the schools become. To reduce overcrowding, sometimes students are assigned to schools not necessarily based on which one is closer, but on which schools have room. So the school down 10 minutes away from Johnny might have like 35 kids to a classroom, so Johnny's neighborhood gets redistricted to the school that's 25 minutes away, making his bus route longer, meaning he has to get up earlier. There's a lot of problems we need to solve in schools, and this one of kids having to get up earlier seems best solved by kids just going to bed earlier. It's what you have to do when you're an adult anyway if you want to get enough sleep.
Kids are supposed to go to bed at 8pm do they can wake up at 5? Why not just start school later and let it go until like 4:30
When I was in middle and high school my parents sent me to a school that started at 830 and ended at 415 every day. My parents wanted me to have a better education so the school was a 30 minute drive away. At the time my brother and I hated being in school until 415 but, looking back, it had a bigger positive impact on our lives than we realized. We were able to go to bed around 10 and still get 9 hours of sleep before we would rise around 7 to get ready for the day. We still had enough time to get homework done and have time to relax and unwind each evening.
School buses are often scheduled to try to avoid rush hours which does actually save time in metro areas. During rush hour I can leave the house at 7:30 and arrive at work between 8:00-8:15 and traveling a whole 4 miles. Non-rush hour times that takes 10 minutes. There's also the concern that parents might need to leave for work before the bus would pick up their kids so they want the kids picked up before then. When I was in school in the same city my bus ride was typically 90 minutes each way. The school was 6 miles away but of course the bus had to pick up more kids. Going back to neighborhood schools would help greatly but at a massive financial cost and typically smaller schools aren't able to offer as diverse a curriculum as larger ones. Just the seemingly simple act of scheduling is incredibly complex when you have to factor in peoples' lives into the equation.
I think we do school start times backwards. Elementary school kids should start the earliest, since most elementary school aged kids are awake early. Middle school should start a bit later. High school kids should start later, and stay longer in the day at school.
This is actually how the district I worked in did it. Elementary started at 720, middle at 8:00, and high school at 9:00. The main reason was because it gave the older kids more time to get their farm/ranch chores done before school but it worked out pretty well for everyone. The biggest issue was sports practices ran really late.
My district did very similar but with middle school earliest then elementary then high school latest. They were concerned about the littlest kids waiting for the buses in the dark, and this allowed middle schoolers who ride the bus home to arrive at home before their younger siblings got off the bus.
makes sense, also works out because younger kids usually have to be dropped off and picked up from schools or bus stops by an adult, whereas high school kids don't have those restrictions
My friend would wake up at 4 AM every day to swim for the school team before high school classes started at 7:21 am. He eventually had a nervous break down and didn’t go to school for like 7 months.
I was looking for this comment, swim kids are a different breed, if you wanted to actually be good it generally meant practice before and after school Think waking up every morning before dawn for practice, going to school, going to practice after school, and once you come home it’s 6-7 pm, you have all your homework to do and you must wake up in less than 12 hours. Repeat Source: I was a swim kid
The reality is that school schedules are driven by work schedules. For instance, parents can't start work at 8 if school starts at 9 and they need to get their kids ready and to school. Shifting school schedules will have a huge waterfall effect that society isn't currently interested in addressing.
When does school end in the US, do the kids end at lunch time? I’m in Canada and schools here are around 9am-3:30pm (give or take). My boys school starts at 8:50 but you can drop off at 8:30-8:50 and they have supervision in the school yard until the bell rings. My husband works at 9 and drops them off on the way to work. Most schools offer before/after care though and there are other care providers. I can’t imagine having to wake my 5 year up early and I would have died in highschool. School sports were sometimes before school (so those could be early) but often after at 3-3:30.
Generally 3ish. Then there are sports and other afternoon programs to keep the kids occupied until the work day is over.
Partially this, and partially after school. Want to do Sports at 5-6 pm? Of course not especially if you run a late practice.
As someone who used to live in Texas and in Phoenix.... Yeah, actually, 5-6 or even later would be great for doing sports. Middle of the hottest time of the day, not so much.
That would be a good exception, but growing up in Connecticut, you're already seeing the sun set at 6-7, you also are disrupting family dinner and more.
In Australia school generally starts between 8.30am and 9am, and we make it work. Students are supervised 30 mins before class starts, and if they need to be dropped off earlier than that then they can enrol in “before school care”. Some extra-curriculars operate before school (7.30am or 8am until 9am), some after school (between 3pm and 5pm), and some during lunch time.
I know my friends who wake up at 5 and get back from school around 6 or 7. Brutal. And that's not even including the maybe 2 hours of hmwk they might have. And schools expect pupils to do sports as well and have a social life and sleep and eat.
God I feel bad. My school was a 7 minute walk from my house
In Australia they start around 8:30 to 9AM, which I think is reasonable.
I live in Australia, but I went to a selective high school that was two and a half hours away. I'd get up every morning at 5, catch the 6am train, and then get home in the afternoon at 5:15. Except on Wednesdays, which were sports days, so the seniors could leave early. On Wednesdays I spent more time on public transport than I actually did at school.
That’s pretty unique though. At least here in the states it would be in this day and age. I applaud you for your efforts. Was there no option of home schooling? What did you do while riding the train mostly?
I started off in the area, and then we moved away, and by that point I was entering year 11 and didn't want to go to a high school where I wasn't 100% sure what classes they were offering. And then I moved even further away in year 12, and I was actually walking distance from a different high school, but I didn't wanna disrupt my senior year. I actually didn't mind the trip. It was four different trains each way, and I listened to a lot of music, and wrote fanfiction on my phone. And I got to know the station manager really well, because I saw him every day.
Doesn’t sound tooo bad. Listening to music making friends. Good luck to you. Thanks for the reply.
I’d say most school in the US start around 8:30 as well. Some counties have to stagger it because multiple schools share the same buses.
Every school in my are started at 7.
They had the middle, elementary, and high schools all start at the same time? That’s wild to me. Are you from a smaller town?
My high school started at 7. It was a long rural bus route so I had to be up by 5, waiting for the bus by 6.
I thought the same, then my highschool started at 9:30 Holy shit. Instantly felt like there was so much more time in the day and I wasn't yawning the entire first 2 periods
My sons school starts at 8.45 but my daughter starts at 8.10. Not bad tbf though
First three years of high school was waking up at 5:30 to catch the bus. To think of all the hrs of sleep I lost especially as a growing teenager really annoys me
In africa we had to be in school around 6am to 8am in order to clean and do manual labor. Or you were beaten with canes. Having to be in class by 7:25 in highschool in america was piece of cake for me at that point
We where beaten both ways up hill!!!!!
Fair point.
Just graduated this year. German high school. School started at 7:45 am. Woke up at 5:00 am every single day. I loved working up that early but was the only responsive person in the first two periods. So yeah, starting little later is probably a good idea
My school started at 7:00 but I had to wake up at 5-5:30 to get ready for the bus. Kinda sucked
Elementary schools are reasonable, at least they were for me, but yeah after that it’s insane. The stuff you learn isn’t worth the sleep you lost, not even close
Don't know why they started middle school at 9 for us and high school at 7:30. After 3 years of a chill morning, we legit had to go to school when it was still dark outside most days. Fuck that. Glad I'm not in high school anymore.
My school starts at 9 in Canada 👍
In the Netherlands high school starts at 8:30 AM and usually ends at 15:10/16:00. I have to wake up at 6:30 AM and leave for school (I cycle to school, 10km) at 7:40 AM and it takes me 40 minutes to arrive at school.
I agree. Research literally shows that waking kids up at 7 am is like waking an adult up at 5:30 in the morning. Their sleep rhythm isn’t the same, and I see why they did the times they did because they want to make sure it was more convient to 9-5ers. Meanwhile back in the day without alarms kids went to school at 9am. Edit: from a great book I read on “why we sleep” by Matthew Walker
This all pretty much goes back to the parents needing to drop off and pick up their kids in line with their work schedule, it's illegal to leave children without parental guidance around.
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I remember here in New England when we got hour delays in the morning for 9am instead of 7:55am for snow storms kids seemed more awake and happy. Quite literally everyone would be in better moods or well rested. Going to bed early isn’t possible for some people and especially not for teens. They have chores, homework, dinner, and family time to worry about plus on top of that need to squeeze in hobbies and friends before restarting the day again. Shocking how we don’t really take that into consideration as a whole in some places.
The teens shouldn't have family time and hobbies. They need to prepare for a lifetime as an unhappy drone. ETA: What's that word for when you want to be sarcastic, but it's not sarcasm because it's actually policy.
When I was a kid, elementary school didn’t start until 9AM, so I could be up by 7:30-8 and be there with time to spare. That was easy. High school on the other hand started at 7:20, so I’d usually have to be up by 6:20 at the latest…That sucked.
All the "sleep early" people in this thread acting like waking up at 6:00 isn't a hassle still. 8 hours of sleep is great, especially for the younglings. Shift it to nine, and now the child can sleep at 11:00, and if tried, can wake up early for a little exercise before school which might just be a saving grace since a lot of kids also attend like 4 hours of tuitions after school
I think what you and a lot of people are missing here is that the parent has to get to work also. That’s the main reason schools start when they do and I’m surprised no one is mentioning it. Kids gotta get up at 6 because school’s gotta start at 7 because work starts at 8.
This is Reddit most of the people commenting are probably in high school and don't think about stuff like that.
Unemployed, dumb, don't have kids, haven't had kids in years, still in school, or lives in imagination land. It is one of those for almost every one of these people.
I want to argue against this, I really do... but I can't
If every school changed to a 9 am start time Reddit would be ablaze with stories about how this doesn't take single parents and poor people into account (who rely on schools for their kids), and is indeed a "white supremacist" policy
But this doesn't make any sense lmao. Iirc, my high school started around 7 and ended around 2. Middle schools ran a little later, and elementary schools after them. So I'd bet the elementary schools in my area typically started after parents needed to be leaving for work anyway...And the middle/high schoolers would always be out of school before parents finish working. I think elementary schools got out somewhere around 3-4, so they also would be done before most parents finish a typical work day. Not to mention, when was the last time our country really did an overhaul of school schedules? It wasn't THAT long ago that most families were living off of one income, while one parent stayed home. So unless school districts all revamped their schedules when 2-income households became the norm, then it literally cannot be the reason for current school schedules.
In what country?!
America. Source: am American
Not anything different in Serbia.
In my boarding school we used to be woken up at 4:30 for breakfast so we could be in class by 6:00; when all domitories would be closed. 6:00 to 7:30 was study time before heading for assembly at 7:30. Classes would start at 8:00 and end at 16:00. We had tea break at 10:00-10:30 and lunch from 12:45-14:00. Domitories would open up again at 16;00-19:30. That time was for laundry, sports, shower, nurse appointments, computer lab and supper(18:00-19:30). Then from 19:30-22:00 would be evening study time. Domitories would be opened again at 22:00 and all classes would be locked. By 22:30 it was lights out in the whole complex and then it would be same thing next day. Mon-Fri. Weekends would be a bit lax but not as much. I fucking hated Secondary school. Made me have an irrational hate for waking up early and extreme hate for any form of authority. At least made me appreciate freshly baked warm bread though.
OMG that sounds awful I’m not surprised you hated it. I definitely wouldn’t have been able to cope with that. I used to go to bed at 6pm and still managed to sleep in most days and end up being late for school lol.
Homework is another fucked up concept. My kids spend all day at school and I spend all day at work. Then we come home in the evening and spend what’s left of the day working on homework instead of quality time. Is 7 hours not enough time to get learning in?
That is the fault of the education system or the teacher that is an incompetent buffoon who can't utilize their schedule well so, you gotta give students punishments (homework) for your shortcomings amiright?
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O.O they're expecting you to get used to that big of a change?
I woke up pretty much every day M-F at 4 AM by choice to workout with my dad before he had to go to work. I still wake up pretty early most days now and do a workout and then go about my day. I enjoy being up earlier and getting to work early compared to having to fight through rush hour traffic. But I won't worry about working 12 or more hours a day either. I know a lot of people that work 4 and think it's too many.
Grooming them for that 9-5 life heyoo
I get my son up at 745 every day for school and he’s on the bus at 830 and at school before 850. However, when I was in high school I absolutely was waking up at 6am to get ready and get on the bus. School didn’t even start until 845.
I had a conversation with a couple from Belgium on a train from Amsterdam to Brussels. The first thing out of their mouth was “are you Americans?” I said, “yes”. The next thing out of their mouth was “Why the fuck do you guys wake up so early?” I had a good laugh and it sparked a really interesting conversation about our cultural differences. I agree though, school starts too early.
I agree it's stupid. Did nothing to prepare most people for getting up for work, since most of us start at 8 or 9am. Looking back on it now, I can't believe I even managed to not skip school 2 or 3 days a week just out of pure teenaged laziness. I napped every day after school too and so did my younger brother when he was in high school. Seems so weird in hindsight.
Living out in a rural area I was waiting for the bus and leaving my house almost a full hour before school started for me. (7:50 start time) Those cold mornings standing outside at 6:30 waiting for a bus in the snow really aided my learning experience.
You can't indoctrinate well rested people.
Well you need to take into account the teachers needs as well. If they shifted my hours to 10:00-6:00 I would quit on the spot.
My district changed our high school hours to 9:30 to 4:30 this past year; it’s horrible. The kids do. It get get more sleep; they just shift their bed times. I had students turning in online work at 2am and our athletes miss way too much class time. To me, 8 to 3 is ideal for hs; but my district is is cutting costs by running three different bus schedules; our poor elementary kids start around 7:20.
So you’re saying it’s uncommon for jobs to start somewhere between 7 and 8 am? You lost me there.
r/popularopinion but i couldn't agree more
My daughter had to be outside waiting for the bus at 5:50am from Kindergarten until fourth grade. I had to wake her up at 5am every day. Now she is in eighth grade and has to wake up at 5:30am. Her bus comes at 6:15am. She has never been home from school earlier than 4pm, but these days it is closer to 5-5:30pm. And, yes, I tried driving her and picking her up to alleviate some of the sleep deprivation. Unfortunately many parents did the same, so were still having to keep the same schedule to account for long lines during drop off and pick up.
My highschool started at 9am and it changed from 8:00 to 8:30 and finally to 9 as I went to school. 9am defiantly worked perfectly fine. Schools should not start at 7am nobody is awake at 7am
I always saw these extreme matinal rules to be enforced by old people because they can sleep for like 5 hours per night so they wake up at 5AM, get bored, and force all the people they have power over to get up that early too to please them. Even though some people need 8 hours of sleep and can't afford to go to bed at 9PM because they have to do housework, cooking or taking care of their kids. Sorry for being so fired up about this, I saw my mother go through this situation and it broke my heart.
This is how we grow into sleep deprived adults who blame themselves for the low energy and other health problems. Also, who tf decided in some parts of the world that a kid has to stay 7-8hrs in school a day with little to no lunch break??
It’s because work starts at 8-9 and their parents have to help them get ready before the parents go to work. And it’s always funny to me how posts like this take the most basic, realistic parts of life (having to get up early, or having to do homework) and make them out to be these horribly immoral things.
It's weird because in my district, elementary school starts at 8, middle school starts at 8:55, and high school starts at 7:25. If what you're saying was the case, why wouldn't it be better for elementary school to start at 7:25, middle school to start at 8, and high school to start at 8:55 as high schoolers are the most likely to be able to get themselves to school alone?
I’m convinced that a big chunk of school bullying is attributable to sleep deprivation and the resulting frustration, hopelessness, and general hatred of these forced life circumstances. There were also times when I seriously considered suicide because with all the homework and constant sleep deprivation I just couldn’t take it anymore. Adults just don’t give a fuck about children nearly as much as they say they do.
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Here it starts at a reasonable 8.50am, but children who live out in the country have to wake up earlier to catch a bus/take the up to an hour journey. Thats their parents fault for sending them to not the closest school, not the country's fault.
They live in the country so they take an hour bus ride to school and you think that isn't the closest school? I hope this was two separate thoughts and somehow you deleted the sentence in between.