Parents push for later start time
Superintendent says delaying school by 1 hour will cost $4M
SOUTH COVENTRY » School start times continue to be a point of contention for the Owen J. Roberts School District, with several parents and community members pushing for a later start to the school day — a change that could cost as much as $4 million annually.
At a recent school board meeting, three residents read from prepared statements, pleading with the board to consider changing start times at the high school and middle school from 7:30 a.m. to no earlier than 8:30 a.m.
District parents Kathy DiMarino and Cheryl Hertzog, who have both been fighting for later start times for several years, quoted statistics that link inadequate sleep in adolescents to depression and anxiety.
“Schools should start at 8:30 a.m. or later,” DiMarino told the board.
That suggestion is based on an American Academy of Pediatrics 2014 recommendation that calls for secondary schools to open no earlier than 8:30 a.m. to avoid sleep deprivation in adolescents.
But district Superintendent Susan Lloyd said that moving the opening bell by an hour would come with a hefty price tag.
Currently, high school and middle schools begin an hour earlier than the elementary schools, which start classes at 8:30 a.m. This schedule allows buses to transport secondary students first and, afterwards, pick up students for the elementary schools.
If the district were to start all schools at 8:30 a.m., rather than staggering the start times, the additional transportation cost would total an estimated $4 million a year, Lloyd said.
Since the issue of sleep deprivation is specific to adolescent sleep cycles, the board also looked into switching high school and middle schools to the 8:30 a.m. start time, and elementary students to 7:30 a.m. The yearly cost of that would total $1 million.
This is not necessarily news to parents. The district formed a committee to look at school start times in 2016, and a study was presented to the school board in February of 2017. That study, which is available on the district’s website, included the results of a district survey which found that only slightly more than 50 percent of students and parents were in favor of changing to a later start time at the high school. Among district staff, less than 20 percent were in favor.
The committee had recommended against changing start times, and instead made suggestions for other options that the district has since implemented. Those include making more online courses and hybrid courses (which require only periodic classroom sessions) available at the high school level. That way, students who need more sleep can craft a schedule that allows them to take in-person classes later in the day.
In addition, the district has also begun including sleep hygiene into the health curriculum, stressing the importance of adequate sleep for mental and physical health.
Nevertheless, it’s clear that the issue of school start times is far from resolved. DiMarino and Hertzog continue to push for later start times.
“Schools can provide healthy start times for students,” DiMarino insisted.
Some board members agree that the matter should be looked into again.
Board member Cathy Whitlock recommended gathering information from other area districts that have altered start times in recent years, including Phoenixville and Unionville-Chadds Ford.
Board President Melissa Booth suggested that the board “take a cursory look” at changing start times by half an hour for both elementary and secondary students. That would mean taking into consideration the impact on after school activities and transportation to private schools, among other things.
Booth stressed that the board has been taking the issue seriously.
“None of us is deaf to the problem,” she said.