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Yes but when you look at time changes holistically, the CDC and sleep experts are recommending that schools start around 9 or 10 am. http://www.smithsonianmag.

Yes but when you look at time changes holistically, the CDC and sleep experts are recommending that schools start around 9 or 10 am. http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/sleep-scientists-say-school-days-should-start-later-180956565/ http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/sleep-scientists-sa... http://www.startschoollater.net/why-change.html http://www.startschoollater.net/why-change.html I'm more and more convinced that most humans just aren't wired to wake up at the crack of dawn. The tech industry owes a lot of its hyper productivity to the fact that they have flexible hours for their engineers which tend to skew later into the day and night.

raldi 10y ago
> I'm more and more convinced that most humans just aren't wired to wake up at the crack of dawn. But ending Standard Time would make everyone get up one hour earlier all winter long.
- bonoboTP 10y ago
  No. School start could be shifted to 9 AM or 10 AM. The clock should show 12 at noon. The clock is not the problem. The problem is that people are required to start their day at a too early time. Fix: increment the time requirements.
  - AckSyn 10y ago
    I find this argument extremely short sighted. Why is starting work early in the day a problem? And why is going to bed at a decent hour to give you an 8 hour sleep period before you have to wake up for work or school a problem?
    - reflexive 10y ago
      > Why is starting work early in the day a problem? It's only a problem if it requires you to get up while it's still dark. Otherwise, I agree with you - go to bed at a decent hour so you can get 8 hours of sleep before sunrise.
      - bonoboTP 10y ago
        People have a natural circadian rhythm. It also matters when you sleep, it's not like you can simply shift your sleep by X hours without consequences. And experts say that school age children and adolescents usually have a circadian rhythm for staying up till a bit later and getting up later. Our culture interprets this as laziness, because agricultural work had to start early so it could be finished before dusk, but neither the earlier hunter-gatherers, nor most of today's jobs fit that requirement. This phenomenon is also called "social jetlag", when people are forced out of their normal rhythm and only stop being a zombie around 10-11 AM. There's really no reason to do this, other than the kinda sadistic reasoning that "we also had to get up early and we survived, you kids also have to learn that life is hard sometimes, that will learn you discipline and build your character". It's no coincidence that many young people like party late at night (or use the computer) when most older folks already want to sleep. There are some evolutionary hypotheses for the reason why young people have an "owl-type" rhythm: perhaps hunting and guarding their home in the dark was their usual nighttime activity.
pavel_lishin 10y ago
I drop my kid off at daycare at the morning - 7:45 is the earliest they accept them. I don't have to be at work until 10, really. I've been doing a lot of thinking during my walks there, and I've concluded that school starts at 8am so that parents can drop their children off before then, and still make it to work on time. That's it.
- pfarnsworth 10y ago
  This is an incorrect conclusion. The occurrence of both parents working has been around for less than 30 years. Before that, the mom used to stay at home, so she would take care of getting the kids ready for school, etc. And yet, school started around the same time then as well.
  - reflexive 10y ago
    > school started around the same time then as well. Do you have a reference for this? One story says schools started bumping their start times earlier in the day in the 1950's, so they could make multiple bus runs (high school first so they start earlier, then elementary). If that's true, the ultimate culprits would presumably be the social engineers who forced kids to bus to distant schools when they previously had been able to walk. Warning: embedded auto-play video (sorry) http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stop-starting-school-days-so-early-doctors-say/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stop-starting-school-days-so-ear...
  - pavel_lishin 10y ago
    That's a good point, I didn't consider that.

raldi 10y ago

> I'm more and more convinced that most humans just aren't wired to wake up at the crack of dawn. But ending Standard Time would make everyone get up one hour earlier all winter long.

bonoboTP 10y ago
No. School start could be shifted to 9 AM or 10 AM. The clock should show 12 at noon. The clock is not the problem. The problem is that people are required to start their day at a too early time. Fix: increment the time requirements.
- AckSyn 10y ago
  I find this argument extremely short sighted. Why is starting work early in the day a problem? And why is going to bed at a decent hour to give you an 8 hour sleep period before you have to wake up for work or school a problem?
  - reflexive 10y ago
    > Why is starting work early in the day a problem? It's only a problem if it requires you to get up while it's still dark. Otherwise, I agree with you - go to bed at a decent hour so you can get 8 hours of sleep before sunrise.
    - bonoboTP 10y ago
      People have a natural circadian rhythm. It also matters when you sleep, it's not like you can simply shift your sleep by X hours without consequences. And experts say that school age children and adolescents usually have a circadian rhythm for staying up till a bit later and getting up later. Our culture interprets this as laziness, because agricultural work had to start early so it could be finished before dusk, but neither the earlier hunter-gatherers, nor most of today's jobs fit that requirement. This phenomenon is also called "social jetlag", when people are forced out of their normal rhythm and only stop being a zombie around 10-11 AM. There's really no reason to do this, other than the kinda sadistic reasoning that "we also had to get up early and we survived, you kids also have to learn that life is hard sometimes, that will learn you discipline and build your character". It's no coincidence that many young people like party late at night (or use the computer) when most older folks already want to sleep. There are some evolutionary hypotheses for the reason why young people have an "owl-type" rhythm: perhaps hunting and guarding their home in the dark was their usual nighttime activity.

pavel_lishin 10y ago

I drop my kid off at daycare at the morning - 7:45 is the earliest they accept them. I don't have to be at work until 10, really. I've been doing a lot of thinking during my walks there, and I've concluded that school starts at 8am so that parents can drop their children off before then, and still make it to work on time. That's it.

pfarnsworth 10y ago
This is an incorrect conclusion. The occurrence of both parents working has been around for less than 30 years. Before that, the mom used to stay at home, so she would take care of getting the kids ready for school, etc. And yet, school started around the same time then as well.
- reflexive 10y ago
  > school started around the same time then as well. Do you have a reference for this? One story says schools started bumping their start times earlier in the day in the 1950's, so they could make multiple bus runs (high school first so they start earlier, then elementary). If that's true, the ultimate culprits would presumably be the social engineers who forced kids to bus to distant schools when they previously had been able to walk. Warning: embedded auto-play video (sorry) http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stop-starting-school-days-so-early-doctors-say/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/stop-starting-school-days-so-ear...
- pavel_lishin 10y ago
  That's a good point, I didn't consider that.