Talawanda Considers Later Start Times

Talawanda High School, the institution whose high school students start the earliest out of all high schools in Butler County at 7:15, has had backlash from some students and parents about starting the day earlier than recommended by most health agencies.  

New studies are out about early school start times and the long term health effects they could have on middle and high school students.

According to Amy Macechko, Talawanda’s district Health and Wellness Coordinator who is pushing for a later start time, an early beginning to a teen’s day could cause current and severe long term health problems.

“Lack of sleep can lead to cognitive problems in terms of thinking, processing, and memory,” Macechko said. “Lack of sleep can also be associated with risk taking behaviors and that could include substance use.”

Superintendent Kelly Spivey tasked Macechko and a team of leading experts in the pediatric field to find a start time that would both meet the needs of students and their health as well as find a plan to meet the feasibility of the district’s financiality.

“Our recommendation as the health coordinating council was to move the [high school] start time back to 8 o’clock,” Macechko said.

An 8 am start time would give students in the high school 45 extra minutes each day to sleep, which could be extremely helpful to a child’s health. “We knew that an 8 am start time would do something,” Macechko said.

Macechko’s reasoning has been the main point made by many who support a later start time and the health benefits that come with it. However, Talawanda has a special dilemma when it comes to making major adjustments. If the high school start time is pushed back to 8, it would prompt an even later start time for Talawanda’s elementary students of 10 am, meaning they wouldn’t be dismissed until around 5 in the afternoon.

But, according to Superintendent Kelly Spivey, it could not be financially able to support a later start time, because new busses may need to be purchased prior to any decisions being made about a time to start.

Petermann Transportation Corp., the private busing company hired out by the district that transports Talawanda students daily, does not have enough buses to simultaneously transport all of the district’s students at once. “It appeared that it wouldn’t be financially feasible, and put it this way, we would have to go to a levy to support it in order to buy new busses,” Spivey told the Tribune.

With not enough buses in place, it would mean that elementary school students, and high school/middle school students, could not start within one hour of each other.

A second solution proposed swapping the start time of both the elementary students and the high school/middle school students, which seems to be the better solution at this point according to most parents. However, there is concern that elementary school children would be waiting for the bus alone in the dark during the early morning hours of the Winter.

Studies have also shown that elementary-aged students are not impacted with getting up earlier in the morning as opposed to high school students, showing that they could handle an early start time better academically. Because Melatonin production, a hormone that make humans sleep, does not stop until 7:30 am for teens, many high school students are still supposed to be sleeping after we start the day. Elementary-aged students’ melatonin creation ends around 7 am, showing they are more adaptable to the early start time.

A survey posted on Talawanda’s website shows that approximately 65 percent of the district’s parents approve of the later start time proposed by the health coordinating council, according to Spivey, who said she would dig deeper and deeper into the start time issue during the February and March school board meetings in order to find an early solution for next year.

But, Spivey did say that people must speak out first, prior to any decision being made. “We will have to see what the public says first, before we move forward,” she commented.