School Start Times for Middle School and High School Students — United States, 2011–12 School Year
Advanced Search
Select up to three search categories and corresponding keywords using the fields to the right. Refer to the Help section for more detailed instructions.

Search our Collections & Repository

For very narrow results

When looking for a specific result

Best used for discovery & interchangable words

Recommended to be used in conjunction with other fields

Dates

to

Document Data
Library
People
Clear All
Clear All

For additional assistance using the Custom Query please check out our Help Page

CDC STACKS serves as an archival repository of CDC-published products including scientific findings, journal articles, guidelines, recommendations, or other public health information authored or co-authored by CDC or funded partners. As a repository, CDC STACKS retains documents in their original published format to ensure public access to scientific information.
i

School Start Times for Middle School and High School Students — United States, 2011–12 School Year

Filetype[PDF-557.74 KB]



Details:

  • Journal Article:
    Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR)
  • Personal Author:
  • Description:
    Adolescents who do not get enough sleep are more likely to be overweight; not engage in daily physical activity; suffer from depressive symptoms; engage in unhealthy risk behaviors such as drinking, smoking tobacco, and using illicit drugs; and perform poorly in school. However, insufficient sleep is common among high school students, with less than one third of U.S. high school students sleeping at least 8 hours on school nights. In a policy statement published in 2014, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) urged middle and high schools to modify start times as a means to enable students to get adequate sleep and improve their health, safety, academic performance, and quality of life. AAP recommended that "middle and high schools should aim for a starting time of no earlier than 8:30 a.m.". To assess state-specific distributions of public middle and high school start times and establish a pre-recommendation baseline, CDC and the U.S. Department of Education analyzed data from the 2011-12 Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS). Among an estimated 39,700 public middle, high, and combined schools* in the United States, the average start time was 8:03 a.m. Overall, only 17.7% of these public schools started school at 8:30 a.m. or later. The percentage of schools with 8:30 a.m. or later start times varied greatly by state, ranging from 0% in Hawaii, Mississippi, and Wyoming to more than three quarters of schools in Alaska (76.8%) and North Dakota (78.5%). A school system start time policy of 8:30 a.m. or later provides teenage students the opportunity to achieve the 8.5-9.5 hours of sleep recommended by AAP and the 8-10 hours recommended by the National Sleep Foundation.
  • Subjects:
  • Source:
  • Series:
  • ISSN:
    0149-2195 (print);1545-861X (digital);
  • Pubmed ID:
    26247433
  • Pubmed Central ID:
    PMC5779581
  • Document Type:
  • Place as Subject:
  • Pages in Document:
    5 pdf pages
  • Volume:
    64
  • Issue:
    30
  • Collection(s):
  • Main Document Checksum:
  • Download URL:
  • File Type:

You May Also Like

Checkout today's featured content at stacks.cdc.gov