We are finishing the first semester and students are just now adjusting to the new schedule of waking up before 7 o’clock, getting up from bed, grabbing a quick breakfast or maybe no breakfast at all, walking, taking the bus to school or even just driving yourself or getting a ride from your parents.

Waking up everyday for school can be very hard and un-motivational to do especially that early in the morning, some days we don’t even go to school to avoid getting up, we’ve all been there at least once, I know I have.

With that being said, many people complain about how early school starts for Tahoma. This has always been a problem even before Covid19, but now a lot of schools around the world are becoming more aware of the situation and are taking action to make high school hours more conducive to the sleep patterns of high school age students. With some schools starting at 7:40am they’ve pushed it to 8:00am for the sake of the students and staff.

Do you think Tahoma should consider having a later start? Would it help students more, not only mentally but academically?

If you’ve been keeping up with all of the Instagram Tahoma accounts you may have seen “THSsnores”, with it being pictures of students asleep in class or around the school, could this problem be because of lack of sleep, or maybe just because they’re un-motivational and bored? or both?

I’ve asked a few people some questions.

“Is it hard for you to wake up in the morning?”

Sophomore Ceceila Wood says “Depending on the amount of sleep I get, yes very. I usually need more than 6 hours of sleep just to get through school, and even if I do get that much I will most likely press snooze on my alarm because I know that I need just around 8-9 hours to get through the day.”

“Do you think there should be a later start to school?”

“I honestly think we should start later, it wont only benefit students’ sleep schedules but also staff. Teachers always say they get up early in the morning just to get to school at 7 am, and if we started school later students would be more energized and ready to work instead of being tired.”

She also adds that ” last year during hybrid when school started later, I payed better attention during class and I always got a good nights sleep.”

Some students though like Freshmen Nicolas DeVogel says that “I personally think we should keep our schedule because I don’t have a lot of free time after school, I think people should just deal with the schedule we have now so we wouldn’t have to get out later”

Freshmen Tyler Wittenborn agrees with Nicolas as well.

There are a lot of mixed feelings about this topic and each opinion is just as valid. This topic is very debatable and in the end it’s up to the school itself to decide what is best. As someone who has difficulty not getting enough sleep, I struggle everyday getting up, which makes me lack focus and just doesn’t really motivate me.

What do you think we should do? Do you think that it is a good idea to keep the schedule we have now or to change it to possibly help with student and staffs sleep schedule?