Persuasive Essay On School Starting Time

688 Words2 Pages

Caroline Kim
Mr. Ali
Composition 8
25 March 2015
School Starting Time
Adolescents sleep at an average of 6.8 hours a night, but need at least more than 9 hours to function properly (Jones 1). Sleep is vital to teenagers’ well-being; it can help you manage stress, assist in regaining your memory with ease, increase your stamina in athletics, improve your grades, maintain a healthy weight, and help keep a positive mind. Receiving less than the least amount of sleep required for the average adolescent can limit your ability to learn, concentrate, remember important information, cause depression or anxiety, cause acne, and lead to aggressive abnormal behavior (National Sleep Foundation 1).
Kids in their teenage years, are heavily deprived of sleep …show more content…

As psychologist Robert Leahy points out: "The average high school kid today has the same level of anxiety as the average psychiatric patient in the early 1950s." Teenagers can not handle the pressure of having to get straight A’s, be the best athlete, and still be social with others. Academic work is taking away these kids lives. Receiving an indecent amount of sleep nightly is not fair because not only do teenagers have to struggle to finish all of their classwork, barely even getting sleep, they can never escape it, even on the weekends. Starting school at abnormally early hours prevent many students from getting the amount of hours per night that most teenagers need. In addition to that, kids are having to walk to the bus station or having to drive to school in the dark while sleep deprived. Drowsy driving increases along with the risk of injury while walking to the bus stop tired and unaware of your surroundings (Start School Later Inc 1). School should start at a reasonable time such as 9:00 am in order for each kid to get a decent amount of sleep per night. It is a proven fact that after schools have changed their starting time to a later hour, they have noticed the teenagers academic and athletic life improve. In this series of facts, it is proven that changing the school starting time, can increase test scores and also regulates safety,“When Jackson Hole High School in Wyoming shifted its start time to

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