Sleepy Teens!

On my way to Norwalk to have my car serviced this morning I saw a familiar sight. At least it was familiar if you’re out and about at 6:45 A.M during the school year. It was middle & high school students waiting for the bus. It wasn’t that dark yet but pretty soon, as the year goes on, they will be standing in the dark. Needless to say, they looked less than enthusiastic about their day ahead-only the second day of school. In fact they looked more like zombies rather than bright eyed kids who in a few minutes would be learning how to conjugate a French or Spanish verb or how to solve a differential equation-which leads to the issue of appropriate school start times for teenagers. About 6 years ago or so there was a very active and vocal group of parents and teachers who petitioned the Board of Education to move the start time of high school up about one and a half hours. They argued that a teenager’s biological rhythm was such that early mornings were just about the worst time of day for quality learning to occur. They presented a ton of research to support their position. The idea started to take hold until the transportation department got into it. It was pointed out that in order to get all those kids to 6 (now 7) different schools on time would cost a whole ton of money. That’s all the Board needed to hear. Conclusion? Suck it up, kiddos. Wake up and learn. But to me the issue hasn’t changed. Just looking at those kids at that hour was depressing. With the Internet being such a presence in everyone's lives, it seems to me there could be some sort of distance-learning program in place that could address part of this problem. Maybe I'll approach the Board with this idea, package it and sell it to other school districts around the country. I'll finally be rich-or not!