breetheflea
Drama Llama
Posts: 6,381 
Location: PNW
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Post by breetheflea on May 11, 2023 16:05:37 GMT
My school district proposed starting hs an hour later, middle school will stay about the same, and elementary would start earlier.
Right now it's hs (7:20), elementary (8:30), middle (9:30) and the change would be elementary (8:00),hs (8:40), and middle (9:30.) Supposedly this will also help the bus driver issues we've been having, although I don't understand the logisitics of that part...
I have kids in all three levels so it would be a big change for us. I would get to sleep in later (ha, I am up at 5:45 no matter what) but now all my kids will be trying to get ready at the same time and I can't be lazy and send my hs kid to pick up her brother... or have her take him in the morning as she'll have to be at the bus stop earlier than the time he can leave for school... although it sure would help ease my mind about my hs kid walking in the dark to the bus stop at 6:30 am...
If your district does this type of schedule, do you like it? If your district changed to this type of schedule did it take time to get used to? I've been on the old schedule for 13 years, it's imprinted on my brain permanently it would take some adjustment.
Just curious...
ETA: when I was in school, all the ms and hs started at 7:40. It was a long six years...I feel like I slept through every first period class I ever had (which was usually math...)
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Post by epeanymous on May 11, 2023 16:11:09 GMT
Our district did this a while ago (elementary now starts at 7:50, and middle/high school at 8:50). I had kids in all three levels at the time, and I think it was a positive change overall--it's easier to get elementary kids to school earlier, and teens benefit from sleep (at the time my elementary lids had started school at 9:25, also, which was a huge challenge for working parents -- it's hard to arrange both before- and after-school childcare).
The one downside is that if you have a little kid who rides the bus, they cannot go to the bus stop alone safely in the AM for much of the year because it is dark.
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Post by snugglebutter on May 11, 2023 16:18:12 GMT
Our district does elementary 7:50, middle 8:15 and high school 9:00. It's been in that order for at least as long as we've lived here, though they adjusted the times slightly a few years ago.
There is research showing that a later start time is beneficial to teens, so hopefully your kids will like it. :-)
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Gennifer
Drama Llama
Posts: 5,171
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Post by Gennifer on May 11, 2023 17:00:10 GMT
My school district has a later start for elementary. I don’t like have two different start/finish times, but I understand why they do it.
It makes far more sense to me to have the older kids start later, like your new schedule.
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Post by Linda on May 11, 2023 17:06:10 GMT
Here it is:
740 PreK-5th
828 high school
835 6th grade
840 7th/8th grade
6th-12th ride the same bus - it drops at all three schools hence the slightly staggered start times
When my kids were elementary school - their bus came at 550-610am which is incredibly early imo. I HATED getting up and getting them up and waiting in the dark for the bus every morning.
My high schooler's bus WAS at 710 until they fired the bus driver (for VERY good reason) and the new one does the route in reverse so it's now at 758. We are BOTH loving that change!
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craftymom101
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 3,776
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Post by craftymom101 on May 11, 2023 17:27:40 GMT
I am in Florida, and in our district, HS starts at 7:05am, MS starts at 8:10am, and Elementary School starts at 8:45am. We have two kids at the high school, one at the middle school, and one in elementary school.
I like the Elementary/Middle school times, but High School starts waaaaaaay too early. Our kids drive to school, and they leave by 6:40/6:45am. They are also done with school at 1:56pm, which means 8+ hours to goof around after school before bedtime. I would like to see the high school moved back to 8:30 or 9:00am. When I taught high school (in a different district), school started at 8:45 (first bell at 8:40), and it was a great start time. Kids were a little sleepy, but not much. I can't imagine trying to teach math or history or science at 7:05am!
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Jili
Pearl Clutcher
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Jun 26, 2014 1:26:48 GMT
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Post by Jili on May 11, 2023 17:54:15 GMT
The school district where I work did something similar a few years ago, but the district where I live has not.
In IL, most high schools are set up in separate districts. This means that as an elementary school district, we have no control over their start/stop times. We usually end up working around their bell schedules and school calendars.
Our district wanted to do this for our middle school students. They ended up moving their start time up a half hour. I believe they wanted them to start later, which would have been possible, but there was concern about how that would impact after school activities and outside extracurricular schedules. So the 8:30 start time they have now was essentially a compromise.
The younger students actually start at 8:15, and the middle-grade/intermediate students start at 9:00. The downside to the younger children is exactly what everyone else has said-- they have to be at the bus stops quite early. Having three tiers of start times absolutely helps with busing. We don't have enough buses to be able to reduce starting times from three to two.
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Post by roxley on May 11, 2023 17:59:57 GMT
Our high school moved to 8:35 - 3:30 right when my first child started. They LOVE it. The school district next to us switched at about the same time but their end time was around 4:00. They are moving back to 7:30 start time next year because they didn’t have time for after school sports.
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Post by Darcy Collins on May 11, 2023 18:35:59 GMT
My kids' high school moved from 7:15 t0 7:45 (the proposal was actually 8:30 but they got a ton of pushback from sports teams. There are a ton of studies that it is academically beneficial for high school students to start later. As I mentioned, the biggest issue was some of the sports fields aren't lit - so they had to compromise so practices wouldn't go into darkness during the winter.
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bethany102399
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 3,623
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Post by bethany102399 on May 11, 2023 18:45:13 GMT
The middle school here starts at 7:15, followed by the high school at 7:40, 6th grade center and then we have 2 starts for elementary schools. This is due to bussing issues from what I understand.
The district used to release early on Thursdays to "give teachers extra time" I put that in quotes as I don't know of any teachers who felt that they actually got extra time. Release is such a zoo, especially at the elementary level, that there was feedback that teachers couldn't use it the way the district wanted them too so we switched to late start on Thursdays. Everyone starts 45 minutes late on Thursdays. Parents hated it, and again I don't know any teachers who were able to use the time.
More complaining, finally starting next year the kids will get extended breaks and days off with teacher work days built into the year. I hope it's a solution that works for them. With both my guys in high school next year I don't feel like it effects me as much as it does those with elementary age kiddos.
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Post by Linda on May 11, 2023 18:47:42 GMT
I am in Florida, and in our district, HS starts at 7:05am, MS starts at 8:10am, and Elementary School starts at 8:45am. We have two kids at the high school, one at the middle school, and one in elementary school. I'm also in Florida and I'm SO glad we don't have that schedule. My oldest caught a bus at 530 for an 830 start and my younger two (we moved) caught buses around 7 for an 830 start most years...I can't even imagine how early they would have had to be up to get there 90 minutes EARLIER. |
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pantsonfire
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Posts: 6,002
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Post by pantsonfire on May 11, 2023 18:55:20 GMT
Our district made the change for the 2020-2021 school year and it has stayed. Of course Ca voted for it but they started a year earlier.
Anyways, grade school starts between 8am and 8:15, high school 8:30 (9:30 on Kate start day) and jr high is 8:45.
I LOVE it. So did dd and ds does too. That extra hour has made a big difference.
It was easily worked out for logistics and no major bumps.
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iowgirl
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 4,280
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Post by iowgirl on May 11, 2023 19:13:05 GMT
It wouldn't work here. Too rural. The buses make one run on each route, so it would be impossible to run multiple times on each route.
8:20 start time for all grades. It has always worked.
I know there is something to the fact of kids learning better if they start later, but I still think they have to figure out how to manage their time and get their butts out of bed and going in the morning. I had one that was an absolute bear to blast out of bed in the morning. It was awful. A lot of it was not going to bed/sleep at a decent time. I know that is a hormonal thing. And I allowed some slack for it, but in the end - when it was time to get up - get the heck up. Turn off the devices and go to sleep at night.
My kids all participated in sports or academic activities that had them at the high school early, often by 6 am for some seasons. They had afterschool sports/activities that kept them at the school til 5:00 and on event days, it was sometimes 10 pm (or later) before they were home. I tried to keep them fed well, and didn't expect a lot of home chores from them during those times. All I asked was for them to have their dirty laundry in baskets. I returned clean baskets - they could leave it in the clean basket or put it away, I didn't care.
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Post by huskermom98 on May 11, 2023 19:36:30 GMT
About 5 years ago our district switched things up. It had been HS & MS starting around 7:30 and then half of the elementary schools around 8 and the other half around 8:30. They switched it to all of the elementary schools starting around 7:30 and HS/MS starting around 8:30. The elementary parents complained for the first few years, but it worked out great for us. The year before the switch I had to drive ODS to school at 7:30, come home and take YDS to his private school around 8. When the public school switched start times I could take both at the same time. I was so glad I didn't have to deal with YDS going from 8:30 to 7:30 since he was in private school by the time the public school switched. Now I can't image trying to get my high school boys up and going for a 7:30 start!
I can't imagine school not starting until 9:30--seems so late!
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caangel
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Posts: 5,676
Location: So Cal
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Post by caangel on May 11, 2023 23:13:50 GMT
So Cal here all 3 of my kids schools (elm, middle and HS) currently start at 8:15. We don't have buses so they walk, ride bikes (tons of electric ones now) or drive/carpool.
Start times are determined by individual schools (with in certain parameters). For example here is an elementary school across the street from the HS and they have a staggered time from the HS to help with traffic. There are about 30+ schools in our k-12 district.
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Post by AussieMeg on May 11, 2023 23:22:44 GMT
OMG, I can't imaging having to start school as early as some of you have posted! When I was at school, pretty much every school, both primary and high school, was 9am - 3:30pm. It hasn't really changed too much over the years. In primary school, my kids started at 8:50am, and finished at 3:30pm. In high school, they started at 8:40am and finished at 3:30pm. I am in Florida, and in our district, HS starts at 7:05am  I cannot imagine!! That seems insane to me. Surely teenagers would not be at their best, and not receptive to learning, that early in the morning. I would have really struggled to get my son up early enough to get to school at that time. (Mind you, he left school after year 11 and got an apprenticeship, and now has to be at work by 7am, sometimes one to two hours away!) |
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Post by Lurkingpea on May 12, 2023 0:46:42 GMT
Our district does elementary 7:50, middle 8:15 and high school 9:00. It's been in that order for at least as long as we've lived here, though they adjusted the times slightly a few years ago. There is research showing that a later start time is beneficial to teens, so hopefully your kids will like it. :-) This. Later start for HS is much better. When you consider bus bound kids have to count an 30 minutes at minimum and up to an hour for transport time it becomes ridiculous. |
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peabay
Prolific Pea
Posts: 9,895
Jun 25, 2014 19:50:41 GMT
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Post by peabay on May 12, 2023 1:12:18 GMT
Early mornings don't make sense for adolescent sleep patterns. It comes down to science.
I absolutely recognize that it also doesn't work for some families and towns to have later starts. It's really a conundrum.
But, just anecdotally, when we went remote for Covid my daughter went from 7:25 am starts to 9 am starts and I noticed a tremendous improvement in her stress levels, her mood and her concentration. And she was not a kid that was staying up all night on her phone etc... she was (is) a diligent student who knew she felt better when she slept more and was always in bed by 10, 10:30.
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Post by littlemama on May 12, 2023 1:16:56 GMT
Our high schools start around 715, middle school 8ish and elementary 850.
I cannot imagine how a later start would work with after school activities and the mountain of homework these kids are buried under.
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Post by Linda on May 12, 2023 2:07:00 GMT
When I was at school, pretty much every school, both primary and high school, was 9am - 3:30pm. We did have early starts in Cyprus but no one complained because we got out early at lunch time (1230-1 irc) and had the whole afternoon to play or go swimming but everywhere else was 9 before I came to the States |
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Post by snugglebutter on May 12, 2023 2:49:29 GMT
I am in Florida, and in our district, HS starts at 7:05am, MS starts at 8:10am, and Elementary School starts at 8:45am. We have two kids at the high school, one at the middle school, and one in elementary school. I'm also in Florida and I'm SO glad we don't have that schedule. My oldest caught a bus at 530 for an 830 start and my younger two (we moved) caught buses around 7 for an 830 start most years...I can't even imagine how early they would have had to be up to get there 90 minutes EARLIER.
Goodness, were they on the bus that long on the way home too? I grew up in a rural area too, but I don't think the bus ride was anything close to that long for anyone.
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Post by 950nancy on May 12, 2023 3:45:38 GMT
It is great for a sleep schedule, but it is harder for kids who have sports or after school jobs.
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Post by crazy4scraps on May 12, 2023 5:05:17 GMT
The district we’re in is talking about switching it up for the ‘24-‘25 school year which would be the year DD starts HS. Right now elementary starts at 8:50, middle school starts at 7:50 and HS is pretty close to that same start time too, maybe a little earlier. They’re talking about flipping it so the older kids start later and the younger kids start earlier. For us it would be a godsend because none of us like having to get up at 6:00 am for the 7:00 am bus, and in fact my night owl kid almost never rolls out of bed before 6:20 as it is. Thankfully we just have one kid so when she’s done so are we, LOL.
It was interesting during Covid when the start time was 9:00 am. I’m sure my kid was much more rested and alert during morning classes, and quite frankly, she was easier to be around because she was less crabby, simply because she didn’t have to get up so early.
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finaledition
Pearl Clutcher
Posts: 4,896
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Post by finaledition on May 12, 2023 6:41:43 GMT
Our school adjusted their schedule. Definitely pros and cons. For our situation the biggest con is that late dismissal creeps into our busy sports schedule. They get dismissed at 3:17 which means we are not home till 4:00. And then it’s a rush to do homework, eat, sports practice, shower, eat again, eat… essentially we miss that hour in the afternoon.
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Post by Linda on May 12, 2023 12:17:22 GMT
Goodness, were they on the bus that long on the way home too? I grew up in a rural area too, but I don't think the bus ride was anything close to that long for anyone. they got home just before 6pm - made for a long, long day. Fortunately he was to read and do homework coming home - too dark for much of the ride in the morning. |
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Post by katiejane on May 13, 2023 8:14:19 GMT
You guys have crazy early start time. I amnin awe you get everyone up and out. For my children it was:
Grade R-6, 9.00 - 3.30
Grade 7-11 8.30 - 3.00
Grade 12-13, 8.15 - 4.15
My 18 year old would much rather have a 9am Start.
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Post by jeremysgirl on May 13, 2023 11:32:36 GMT
It's funny not a single person on this thread has mentioned the overwhelming argument against making high school start times later and elementary start times earlier that we get every time our district tries to adjust things. And it is they want high school students home in time to babysit elementary school siblings. This issue has been raised by parents at our district for years upon years. Parents cannot afford after school childcare for their young kids.
I have to wonder if this is not mentioned in this thread because people live in more affluent school districts than we do? Also there isn't all this parent drop off either. Kids ride the bus or walk depending on where they live. There is no overwhelming parent pick up line like some of you describe in threads here. My kids always rode the bus other than when we lived a block from the middle school, the kids walked, and in high school when Chloe had a car she drove senior year.
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Post by Spongemom Scrappants on May 13, 2023 11:41:19 GMT
It is great for a sleep schedule, but it is harder for kids who have sports or after school jobs. I liked earlier starts so my kids got out earlier. More time for their activities and for family time in the late afternoon and evening. But as teenagers, getting them up for those early starts got harder. I can certainly see the argument for a later start for them. Mine came along at a time when school started essentially the same time for any grade and we followed the old traditional school calendar rather than year round. I suppose if they were in school now I’d be rolling with the changes. |
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RosieKat
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Post by RosieKat on May 13, 2023 16:11:16 GMT
Our times are E - 7:40 to 2:55, M - 8:20 to 3:35, H - 9:05 to 4:20.
We are always having problem getting enough buses, but I think part of that is that our district does cover a large geographic area that isn't always very easy to get across.
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johnnysmom
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Jun 25, 2014 21:16:33 GMT
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Post by johnnysmom on May 13, 2023 18:10:22 GMT
We live in a small district where the schools are are on one campus. Schools all start/end at the same time: 7:50-3:00. There was a big uproar this year because while the elementary kids are allowed in at 7:35 (and have an immediate recess) the MS/HS students are allowed in at 7:20 to allow time for free breakfast before school (elem gets free bfast too, but they eat in their classrooms at 7:50). Parents were pissed bc they wanted to drop their elem kids off the same time as their older kids but there’s no one to watch them. I can’t imagine the drama if the buses ran at different times 🙄
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I cannot imagine!! That seems insane to me. Surely teenagers would not be at their best, and not receptive to learning, that early in the morning. I would have really struggled to get my son up early enough to get to school at that time. (Mind you, he left school after year 11 and got an apprenticeship, and now has to be at work by 7am, sometimes one to two hours away!)
