Research Paper: Delaying School Start Times for Sleep

Author: Jai Hao Wu

Editors: Jasleen Matharu and He-Hanson Xuan

Artist: Guanxin (Acey) Li

Sleep deprivation is a common occurrence for teenagers in today’s world. Since fixing sleep schedules is too hard, let’s investigate the remediative solution of delaying start times. Read this research paper-like article to find out why exactly every school should start later during the morning.

Rebecca sleeps only 2 hours before she goes to school. To cope with the decreased attention span and exhaustion caused by the lack of sleep, she consumes coffee to stay awake With a part time job, extracurriculars, homework, and chores that overwhelm her, Rebecca stays up late into the night again This repetitive state throughout the school year leads to chronic sleep deprivation. Since students do not sleep for as long as they should, they resort to naps and caffeine to make up for the deficiency in sleep. This common phenomenon among adolescents presents a major problem towards their quality of life and education

The majority of students do not sleep enough In a report by the CDC, Short Sleep Duration Among Middle School and High School Students United States, 2015, 72.7% of high school students who participated in the national Youth Risk