Later School Start For Teenagers Brings Drop In Absenteeism

krou writes "Monkseaton High School in North Tyneside, UK, began an experiment in October that saw its 800 pupils ranging in age from 13-19 attend school an hour later than normal, at 10am. Early results indicate that 'general absence has dropped by 8% and persistent absenteeism by 27%.' Head teacher Paul Kelley supported the idea because he believed that 'it was now medically established that it was better for teenagers to start their school day later in terms of their mental and physical health and how they learn better in the afternoon', and he now claims that the children are becoming 'happier better educated teenagers' as a result of the experiment. The experiment is being overseen by Oxford neuroscience professor Russell Foster. 'He performed memory tests on pupils at the school which suggested the more difficult lessons should take place in the afternoon. He said young people's body clocks may shift as they reach their teenage years — meaning they want to get up later not because they are lazy but because they are biologically programmed to do.'"

Comments

Wellington High School already does this

[gringer]

At Wellington High School, they have been starting the seniors about an hour later for the last few years. It seems to work well, and the students are happier for it.

Re:What About The Parents?

[crmarvin42]

I agree that the OP is guilty of a broad generalization. Plenty of kids developed the ability to supervise themselves before they turn 18. However, unsupervised time is directly correlated with delinquent behavior. You sound like someone who developed a strong ethic early on, but many children at 14, 15 or even 16 are still highly impressionable by peer pressure, gang culture, etc. It's not that an increase in unsupervised time will always result in increased deliquent behavior in every child, but that it increases the proportion of children that will engage in such behavior, and increase the amount of deliquent behavior in others.

Four of the 5 kids in my house participated in delinquent behaviors to some extent (my youngest sister is damn near a saint) with similiar exposure to unstructured/unsupervised time. When that time increased my youngest brother increased the amount of delinquent behavior, but it stayed below the level of police invovlement. The same cannot be said of my other sister. My older brother and I managed to keep our delinquent behavior relatively unchanged, in part becase we were responsible for watching our younger siblings during that time.

With all of that being said... I don't believe that starting HS an hour later will be the problem they invision. The added hour of unsupervised time in the morning is most likely going to be taken up by sleep or time in front of the TV. Besides, starting an hour later in the AM means getting out an hour later in the PM. That means there will be 1 less hour between release from school and when the parents get home. I almost never got into trouble before noon on the weekends, and never during the school week. If anything I believe that this will lead to decreased delinquent behavior in the hours after school.