MCPS HS Start-times need to be changed

[Anonymous]

YES.

A million times so.

[Anonymous]

The county went through this exercise a few years ago. Bottom line is it was millions in extra buses and drivers to make it work and they discovered lots of families needed the older kids to pick up younger ones and watch them while parents worked. That can’t happen if elementary gets out hours before the high schoolers. They shifted the start back 10 or 15 minutes.

[Anonymous]

Its not like they did not cover this a few years ago. MCPS decided older kids should be home first to watch younger kids and later school days means kids who need to work have a harder time getting hours in. They made everything 20 mins later.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, have you stopped to consider later start time would be an issue with activities and homework? If kids don't get home till 4:30, everything would just be shifted later and kids would go to bed later, so that really doesn't fix anything.

That's funny. My younger kids go to private school and go to bed at reasonable times, even with activities. Late start times are so much healthier for teens. It's not like there is any medical expert who disagrees. It's funny how so many people claim to be concerned about kids' mental health but aren't willing to entertain this universally agreed-upon adjustment that would benefit the health of teenagers.

Younger kids are not high school kids. Your kids are probably not having homework and multiple activities, some twice a night do you don’t get it. They are not healthier. Going to bed at a decent hour is. So, if you had later start times, my kids could not start homework till after nine vs coming home, homework and early dinner then activities.

God you are dumb. Teens have a different biological internal clock. “Going to bed at a decent hour” does not work with their internal clock. Dumb as a box of rocks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, have you stopped to consider later start time would be an issue with activities and homework? If kids don't get home till 4:30, everything would just be shifted later and kids would go to bed later, so that really doesn't fix anything.

That's funny. My younger kids go to private school and go to bed at reasonable times, even with activities. Late start times are so much healthier for teens. It's not like there is any medical expert who disagrees. It's funny how so many people claim to be concerned about kids' mental health but aren't willing to entertain this universally agreed-upon adjustment that would benefit the health of teenagers.

Younger kids are not high school kids. Your kids are probably not having homework and multiple activities, some twice a night do you don’t get it. They are not healthier. Going to bed at a decent hour is. So, if you had later start times, my kids could not start homework till after nine vs coming home, homework and early dinner then activities.

Sorry - that didn't make sense. My younger kids are teenagers. I was going to compare them to my older kids who went to public school to stress how much less exhausted the private school kids due to the later start times.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The county went through this exercise a few years ago. Bottom line is it was millions in extra buses and drivers to make it work and they discovered lots of families needed the older kids to pick up younger ones and watch them while parents worked. That can’t happen if elementary gets out hours before the high schoolers. They shifted the start back 10 or 15 minutes.

Older kids need sleep patterns that work with their biology over having to be a built in babysitter.

[Anonymous]

The reality is unless you get a later bus drivers and put start and end times closer together it can’t work for everyone. I love somewhere where the times wet reversed. There were a lot more kids in after school care because ES dismissed before 3pm. Not to mentioned trying to get ES kids up and out the door to the bus stop in the morning dark wasn’t fun for many parents. Imagine your ES kids bus time being 6:50am.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The reality is unless you get a later bus drivers and put start and end times closer together it can’t work for everyone. I love somewhere where the times wet reversed. There were a lot more kids in after school care because ES dismissed before 3pm. Not to mentioned trying to get ES kids up and out the door to the bus stop in the morning dark wasn’t fun for many parents. Imagine your ES kids bus time being 6:50am.

Wait till your kids are older.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, have you stopped to consider later start time would be an issue with activities and homework? If kids don't get home till 4:30, everything would just be shifted later and kids would go to bed later, so that really doesn't fix anything.

That's funny. My younger kids go to private school and go to bed at reasonable times, even with activities. Late start times are so much healthier for teens. It's not like there is any medical expert who disagrees. It's funny how so many people claim to be concerned about kids' mental health but aren't willing to entertain this universally agreed-upon adjustment that would benefit the health of teenagers.

Younger kids are not high school kids. Your kids are probably not having homework and multiple activities, some twice a night do you don’t get it. They are not healthier. Going to bed at a decent hour is. So, if you had later start times, my kids could not start homework till after nine vs coming home, homework and early dinner then activities.

Sorry - that didn't make sense. My younger kids are teenagers. I was going to compare them to my older kids who went to public school to stress how much less exhausted the private school kids due to the later start times.

Then your kids are not in outside school activities so there is no real impact. You can send the younger ones to private too. Problem solved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The reality is unless you get a later bus drivers and put start and end times closer together it can’t work for everyone. I love somewhere where the times wet reversed. There were a lot more kids in after school care because ES dismissed before 3pm. Not to mentioned trying to get ES kids up and out the door to the bus stop in the morning dark wasn’t fun for many parents. Imagine your ES kids bus time being 6:50am.

Wait till your kids are older.

Already there. Not to mention I did two different schedules in HS so I already know what the difference is personally. Still have the same snarky response?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The reality is unless you get a later bus drivers and put start and end times closer together it can’t work for everyone. I love somewhere where the times wet reversed. There were a lot more kids in after school care because ES dismissed before 3pm. Not to mentioned trying to get ES kids up and out the door to the bus stop in the morning dark wasn’t fun for many parents. Imagine your ES kids bus time being 6:50am.

Wait till your kids are older.

Already there. Not to mention I did two different schedules in HS so I already know what the difference is personally. Still have the same snarky response?

Your choice to have your kids at different schools. Clearly yours are not in multiple activities that meet more than once a week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The reality is unless you get a later bus drivers and put start and end times closer together it can’t work for everyone. I love somewhere where the times wet reversed. There were a lot more kids in after school care because ES dismissed before 3pm. Not to mentioned trying to get ES kids up and out the door to the bus stop in the morning dark wasn’t fun for many parents. Imagine your ES kids bus time being 6:50am.

Wait till your kids are older.

Already there. Not to mention I did two different schedules in HS so I already know what the difference is personally. Still have the same snarky response?

Your choice to have your kids at different schools. Clearly yours are not in multiple activities that meet more than once a week.

Plenty of people have kids in different schools simple because they are different ages and thus span ES, MS, HS. And we participate in activities, but don’t believe this is a badge of honor that should dictate school times.

[Anonymous]

Folks who are saying it can’t be done are not willing to think outside the box. DCPS starts at 8.45 am. How do they manage after school activities?
FCPS shifted to a later start time. The entire state of CA is shifting to later high school times. Yet somehow this is impossible to do for MCPS. All the research agrees that later start times are healthier for teens. Even 8 am would be an improvement to what we have now

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, have you stopped to consider later start time would be an issue with activities and homework? If kids don't get home till 4:30, everything would just be shifted later and kids would go to bed later, so that really doesn't fix anything.

That's funny. My younger kids go to private school and go to bed at reasonable times, even with activities. Late start times are so much healthier for teens. It's not like there is any medical expert who disagrees. It's funny how so many people claim to be concerned about kids' mental health but aren't willing to entertain this universally agreed-upon adjustment that would benefit the health of teenagers.

Younger kids are not high school kids. Your kids are probably not having homework and multiple activities, some twice a night do you don’t get it. They are not healthier. Going to bed at a decent hour is. So, if you had later start times, my kids could not start homework till after nine vs coming home, homework and early dinner then activities.

Sorry - that didn't make sense. My younger kids are teenagers. I was going to compare them to my older kids who went to public school to stress how much less exhausted the private school kids due to the later start times.

Then your kids are not in outside school activities so there is no real impact. You can send the younger ones to private too. Problem solved.

Then kids in most other states would not be in outside activities. Obviously, you see how ridiculous your statement is. Activities just get shifted to later. Duh! Problem solved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, have you stopped to consider later start time would be an issue with activities and homework? If kids don't get home till 4:30, everything would just be shifted later and kids would go to bed later, so that really doesn't fix anything.

That's funny. My younger kids go to private school and go to bed at reasonable times, even with activities. Late start times are so much healthier for teens. It's not like there is any medical expert who disagrees. It's funny how so many people claim to be concerned about kids' mental health but aren't willing to entertain this universally agreed-upon adjustment that would benefit the health of teenagers.

What universally agreed upon adjustment?

Are you saying there's universal agreement about changing start times? Because there isn't. There are good arguments on both sides.