Later start times for older students? (middle school, computer science, salary, principal)

[Radical_Thinker]

If they move the start time an hour later, does that mean that the ending time is also an hour later as well? If that's the case, what's the point?

A better solution is limit the school day to 5 hours - that's plenty enough time for the average student. Start school about 9:30 am and let them out at 2:30 - three if they do an hour lunch. Instead of six or seven classes a day, just do four a day. That would save millions per school district, and give the most precious gift of all - time. There is a great deal more to a child's life than school and homework.

I'm also a huge advocate of homeschooling / unschooling, with public financial support. A whole lot more parents would be able to stay home and teach their kids if they got a cut of the $11,000 or so they spend per student.

[Radical_Thinker]

Originally Posted by 2nd trick op

Better yet. let every qualified (I. E: not indoctrinated in Leftism) student with a sufficient I. Q opt out in favor of homeschooling; public school budgets (and especially, "teacher" salaries) should then be reduced in direct proportion to the inflated enrollments and unnecessary staff and other overhead -- lust as in a market-driven economy.

A better solution than that is have universal vouchers, and allow students test into whatever schools they're eligible for. Or the vouchers can be used for homeschooling. The "bad" schools would wither away, while the "good" schools would have to add floors and extra buildings to accommodate the surge in students. This way, everyone gets a fair shake, based on merit.

As for kids that just do not want to learn (and you certainly can't force them) - I say offer year-round children's camps to keep those kids occupied (and maybe educate them via alternate methods.)

Sure beats having crappy schools in high-crime areas where kids have line up to go through metal detectors.

[K12144]

Originally Posted by 2nd trick op

My parents, and grandparents were simple dairy farmers and factory workers --burdened by large families in an agrarian society reliant mostly upon non-directly compensated raw labor; the rounding out that enabled me to escape their lot was provided by aunts and uncles (career-educators, but under the disciplines of an earlier day), unmarried for the most part, who inspired me to escape the tedium and drudgery. "Privilege" had very little to do with this.

As with homeschooling and too much of the world of employment, a lot of us could earn more, and do it in less time, if the unnecessary structure were reduced or elminated.

Again, are you offering to pay these families the lost wages of a parent that will stay home, as well as pay for whatever training the parent needs to become an educator? You'll be ponying up for the extra oversight that will be needed for making sure each family is doing it correctly? Making sure it's not just women expected to stay home? Dealing with the burnout of parents who didn't want to grow up to be teachers? Etc.?

Originally Posted by Radical_Thinker

A whole lot more parents would be able to stay home and teach their kids if they got a cut of the $11,000 or so they spend per student.

You think $11,000 will replace a parent's lost wages???

Originally Posted by Radical_Thinker

A better solution than that is have universal vouchers, and allow students test into whatever schools they're eligible for. Or the vouchers can be used for homeschooling. The "bad" schools would wither away, while the "good" schools would have to add floors and extra buildings to accommodate the surge in students. This way, everyone gets a fair shake, based on merit.

As for kids that just do not want to learn (and you certainly can't force them) - I say offer year-round children's camps to keep those kids occupied (and maybe educate them via alternate methods.)

Sure beats having crappy schools in high-crime areas where kids have line up to go through metal detectors.

So do the poor performers get shunted into the crappy schools to perpetuate the cycle?

Bad schools would "wither away" the way they do now? (Oh, wait...)

With whom would they add additional staffing for these "good" schools? Teachers from the "bad" schools? Who pays for the additions while the buildings of the "bad" schools rot?

What happens to the kids who "just do not want to learn"? We just let them grow up uneducated?

[tnff]

Originally Posted by Radical_Thinker

If they move the start time an hour later, does that mean that the ending time is also an hour later as well? If that's the case, what's the point?

A better solution is limit the school day to 5 hours - that's plenty enough time for the average student. Start school about 9:30 am and let them out at 2:30 - three if they do an hour lunch. Instead of six or seven classes a day, just do four a day. That would save millions per school district, and give the most precious gift of all - time. There is a great deal more to a child's life than school and homework.

I'm also a huge advocate of homeschooling / unschooling, with public financial support. A whole lot more parents would be able to stay home and teach their kids if they got a cut of the $11,000 or so they spend per student.

Do you really believe $11,000 will equal the lost income for a parent to stay home?

Originally Posted by Radical_Thinker

A better solution than that is have universal vouchers, and allow students test into whatever schools they're eligible for. Or the vouchers can be used for homeschooling. The "bad" schools would wither away, while the "good" schools would have to add floors and extra buildings to accommodate the surge in students. This way, everyone gets a fair shake, based on merit.

As for kids that just do not want to learn (and you certainly can't force them) - I say offer year-round children's camps to keep those kids occupied (and maybe educate them via alternate methods.)

Sure beats having crappy schools in high-crime areas where kids have line up to go through metal detectors.

So how exactly do the "bad schools" wither away and the "good schools" add extra floors? You do realize do you not that parents/students, even if they had total choice of schools can only walk/drive/be bused so far right? The "market" to use that term is relatively fixed within a geographic area. If the school in that area is "bad" what do you do to move the students to a new "better" school? And if you move the students, do you not just move the problem with you? So that the previously "better" school becomes the new "bad" school. Students and their parents are the biggest influence on school quality so you really aren't fixing anything.

[cebuan]

Automatic fail in districts where students of all ages ride the sane bus route.

[BirdieBelle]

Originally Posted by cebuan

Automatic fail in districts where students of all ages ride the sane bus route.

Yep, and that’s the least of the foul-ups that would have to be dealt with.

If later start times were a viable alternative, it would already be a best practice.

[StealthRabbit]

Dairy Farm Boarding School is a good option for teenagers who need to tweak their Circadian rhythms.
Up at 4AM, THANKKFUL to get to escape to school at 7:30AM, Home by 4PM, more milking (7 days / week) do homework till midnight.

That adjustment will serve them well in 'real' life! (i.e. JOBS)



I am more keen on schools that run multiple shifts / day... saving infrastructure costs, getting more service out of existing buildings and staff.

Raised, fed, and educated my own.

[guidoLaMoto]

Forty five yrs of gen med practice has led me to conclude that different age groups, by and large, have different sleep schedules-


-Infants sleep all day and night with only a few wakeful hrs; toddlers wake early but need nap in the afternoon; young kids are ready to sleep at 8PM and wake at 7AM; we older flati fall asleep at 6PM but wake at 3AM (Seinfeld and "the Early Bird Special in FL") and teenagers , if left to their own, would fall asleep at 2AM and wake at Noon.....Could it be evolutionary? This way there would always be a shift ready to guard the entrance to the cave covering the 24 hr cycle. ??


Don't fight MotherNature.

Originally Posted by 2nd trick op

Better yet. let every qualified (I. E: not indoctrinated in Leftism) student with a sufficient I. Q opt out in favor of homeschooling; public school budgets (and especially, "teacher" salaries) should then be reduced in direct proportion to the inflated enrollments and unnecessary staff and other overhead -- lust as in a market-driven economy.

Your sagacity is lost on the socialists who run our ed system. Despite being so open-minded, they haven't caught on yet that everyone is different.

[2nd trick op]

Originally Posted by StealthRabbit

Dairy Farm Boarding School is a good option for teenagers who need to tweak their Circadian rhythms.
Up at 4AM, THANKKFUL to get to escape to school at 7:30AM, Home by 4PM, more milking (7 days / week) do homework till midnight.

That adjustment will serve them well in 'real' life! (i.e. JOBS)

I am more keen on schools that run multiple shifts / day... saving infrastructure costs, getting more service out of existing buildings and staff.

Raised, fed, and educated my own.

And you would have been a big success ….. back in 1885 when everyone got up, and went to bed with the chickens.

My "screen name" of "2nd trick op" came from a short stint with the railroads -- where shifts were referred to as "tricks"-- First Trick was 7AM-3PM. Second was 3-11PM and Third, 11PM-7AM. Third trick attracted the party animals, First was for the settled "home guards", and the introverts gravitated to Second shift/"trick". I found a similar pattern in warehouses and factories which operated semi-continuously.

One of my biggest career disappointments came when a knack for math prompted me to expand my credits in accounting and taxes; I did very well -- so long as the figures were agreed upon in advance and the procedures well-defined -- could be "plugged in" and finished quickly, at a time of one's own choosing; not so well when rousted by 8 AM to deal with a widowed grandmother or a "fly by the seat of the pants" type from a provincial neighborhood. The requirement to wear expensive business clothing (furnished at one's own expense / non-tax-deductible) was the last straw of insult added to injury.

"All our knowledge is ….. ourselves to know" (Alexander Pope)

[chiluvr1228]

When my oldest started High School he had to be in class at 7:10 a.m. Then the next year they changed it to 8 something. Some kids loved it but others complained because now they were getting out of school an hour later and it was effecting their after school jobs. Sometimes you just can't win. I personally think high school should start later. There's enough scientific studies out there that shows the benefits of not having teenagers getting up so early.