Phil Stover, a science teacher at North Grenville District High School in Kemptville for almost 30 years, has seen the effects of the shift from a 9am start time to an 8am start. He says there were obvious signs that the earlier start was affecting the students in a negative way.
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Stover says other than lateness, the other immediate effect was that many of the students skipped breakfast, in order to get in a few more minutes of shut-eye before they had to run out the door to catch a bus.
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Stover says an earlier start time means more students don’t really ‘wake up’ until after first period.
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A number of studies have been done on the subject, with the latest being from the American Academy of Pediatrics, who say the school day should start no earlier than 8:30am with the ideal start being 9:30am, in order to compensate for the teenaged biological clock.