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School Start Times

Summary

View the complete results for this topic.

While there is demand from certain sections of the community that school start times be changed, the results of this survey show that this demand is diverse and that there isn’t any kind of consensus about what change should be made, and how it should be accomplished.

Generally speaking, there is little support for any of the tested proposals – certainly not the kind of support one would want to see before making changes.

Results show that…

41.5% of respondents think the present high school start time of 7.30am is too early – but 55.0% think 7.30am is about right for high schools
82.7% think 8.15am is about right for middle schools
78.5% think 9.00am is about right for elementary schools
If they were in charge of making the decision, 41.7% of respondents would keep the high school start time at 7.30am - 21.4% would move it to 8.00am
The mean high school start time response among all respondents is 7.58am
57.3% would leave middle schools starting at 8.15am
The mean middle school start time response is 8.17am
66.1% would leave elementary schools starting at 9.00am
The mean elementary school start time response is 8.45am

Combining respondents proposed start times at the three levels, we see the following significant responses…

TIMES

Count %

7.30am 8.15am 9.00am 127 32.8%

8.00am 8.15am 9.00am 19 5.0%

8.00am 8.30am 9.00am 15 4.0%

8.00am 8.00am 8.00am 15 3.8%

9.00am 9.00am 9.00am 15 3.8%

8.15am 8.15am 9.00am 13 3.3%

8.30am 8.30am 9.00am 10 2.7%

8.00am 8.00am 9.00am 9 2.3%

8.30am 8.15am 9.00am 8 2.0%

9.00am 8.15am 7.30am 7 1.9%

8.15am 8.15am 8.15am 7 1.8%

8.00am 8.15am 8.30am 7 1.7%

7.30am 8.00am 8.30am 6 1.7%

7.30am 8.15am 8.30am 6 1.5%

9.00am 8.15am 9.00am 6 1.4%

In other words, 32.8% of respondents propose leaving all three start times the same.

The next three most significant other responses, totaling 12.8%, all proposed moving high school up to 8.00am. 5.0% say leave the middle and elementary levels the same as they are now, 4.0% say move middle to 8.30am, and 3.8% say start them all at 8.00am.

Four specific start time proposals were tested. None of them were very well received, as follows in reverse order of popularity.

Start elementary at 7:30am, middle schools at 8:15 and high schools at 9:00am:

Bar graph for results of Flip Times: 7.2% Strongly favor, 4.2% Mildly favor, 2.9% Neutral, 8.6% Mildly oppose, 77.0% Strongly oppose

Switch the middle school and high school start time so middle school begins at 7.30am and high school begins at 8.15am. Elementary schools would still start at 9 am:

Start all schools 45 minutes later than they currently start, 8.15am for high schools, 9.00am for middle school, and 9.45am for elementary school:

Bar graph of All 45 minutes later: 13.5% Strongly favor, 18.0% Mildly favor, 3.1% Neutral, 24.2% Mildly oppose, 41.3% Strongly oppose

Buy more school buses and start middle school and high school at the same time, 8.15am, and keep elementary start times at 9.00am:

Bar graph of Buy buses - 8:15a high school: 24.0% Strongly favor, 23.3% Mildly favor, 5.3% Neutral, 15.6% Mildly oppose, 31.9% Strongly oppose

The first three proposals are clearly non-starters from a public opinion point of view. The last option – to buy more school buses and start high schools at 8.15am shows the most public support, 47.3%, but is still opposed by a higher percentage, 47.5%.

Recommendation – There is no straightforward solution to this issue. The only course of action that enjoys any kind of solid support is to leave start times the way they are.

January 2002 Survey

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