This is the best idea - I hated High School for our first two starting and ending so early. It is counter to all research done on education as far as children being able to function and succeed. Not to mention, the early out only gives them more time during their most lucid time to do things that aren't so positive unless they are in activities, sports or supervised after school.

While allowing teens more sleep is a laudable idea, pushing school start times back would severely curtail after-school activities, like sports, which are a valuable part of the learning experience.

I'd be careful what you wish for. If the County decides to delay the start of school for teens and the bus schedules are a main concern, would parents be willing to give up the schools their children currently attend so that the children could walk or bus to a closer school? My first thought is about the Town of Kensington - would the residents be happy if the students were no longer bused to Walter Johnson and were required to walk to the much closer Albert Einstein?

My son is on a basketball team and some days, even in the off season, he has 4 hours of time devoted to work outs and basketball. He is also taking some very difficult AP classes in school and is often is up past midnight to complete his homework and studies. If school started later, then school would end later, resulting in less time for homework. He would just end up staying up until he gets it all done and would not get any more sleep. There are also teens who work to help their family pay the bills-they need time after school to help their families. If you polled the kids-I'm pretty sure they would all agree they need more sleep, but not at the expense of losing time in the afternoon. In the not to distant future, I hope schools will be offering online FREE courses as options during the school year, so students who want to sleep an extra hour could take a class at home online, and in this case, they would have to find their own transportation to school so it won't cost taxpayers more.

This is a great example of people taking control and working to change things. Learn about how you can build off an idea, start campaigns and influence leaders, elected officials and others at blastroots.com

It's great to see so many concerned Montgomery County citizens talking about this important issue. The shift the petition talks about is only about an hour -- many schools all over the country manage to fit in the full array of extracurriculars, including sports, after 3 or 3:30 pm. Loudoun County's champion football teams are a case in point -- high school starts at 9, and the student athletes still participate on winning teams!

Studies show that when school starts an hour later, students actually get about an extra hour of sleep. This is powerful medicine to combat obesity, diabetes risk, depression, and risky behaviors -- and a well-rested athlete is a better athlete.

This is a critical change that absolutely needs to happen. I have already seen the impact of the ridiculous 6:30 a.m. departure time on my 9th grader. He is so tired that he cannot think during his first class. He is tired every afternoon, so exercise is a struggle. He is irritable every evening so homework is a struggle. It is NOT SUFFICIENT for the school system to say "put your kids to bed earlier". You don't "put" a 15-year old to bed. Their natural sleep patterns make it impossible for most teens to sleep at 9 p.m. The school system is led by smart people -- I cannot BELIEVE that we let the bus service dictate the quality of education our children get. In Loudon, they flipped the high school start time to the latest and started the elementary school earlier. This works for most children, as young children naturally wake up earlier. Unfortunately, despite paying high taxes to live in the Montgomery County school system, I am starting to look at private schools for my children, primarily because of the start time issue. This is ridiculous.

I hate seeing the kids standing out at the bus stops in the cold and DARK at 6:30-6:45 in the morning. My middle schooler catches the bus at 7:15 which is ok but then the elementary bus doesn't come until 8:30. Maybe the High Schoolers could be between the Middle and Elementary times?

When I was in college, I had classes that started at 10am and I could (and did) fall asleep in class because I went to bed late the night before. Make later HS start times and that's exactly what will happen - the kids will just stay up later.

The teacher's union will make absolutely certain it never happens. Quit dreaming.

Early high school start times and adolescent sleep loss impact the health, safety, and quality of education for teens nationwide. Your board and district administrators have an option that will make things better for the kids in your community. Hope they listen to the good parents who are behind the petition and implement a later start time. Good policies are based on good information and the evidence on this issue is overwhelming: http://startschoollater.pbworks.com/w/page/58217472/Start%20School%20Later%20Reference%20List

We've seen two students through HS in Montgomery County. They attended 3 different high schools. One of the factors in switching for the one child was that he had to catch a bus at 6:15 AM. It wasn't working. It wasn't healthy. It was miserable. For the other child, no matter what we or she or her doctors tried, we could not change her sleep pattern and she had to be up at 5:30AM to stand in the dark at 6:30. These are kids that managed multiple AP classes, sports, jobs, activities....An hour and change difference would not have harmed their extra activities.

I'm all for swapping the times and bus availability of the HS and ES students. When kid #2 was in ES, we paid for before AND after care. If the ES day started later, parents might pay more on the PM side, but wouldn't have to pay on the AM side and it could be a financial wash. AND the HS students might actually function better.

A swap between ES and HS start times would be very challenging. Do we want 4 and 5 year olds at bus stops at 6:30 am? How many parents keep ES kids up too late as it is because they get home at 6 pm and want to spend a little time with them? It's not going to be easy or cheap to fix.

As a parent whose child is among those least able to cope with the early start times I'm all in favor of changing the start time. Having been a school bus driver with the opposite progression of school start times (elementary, middle, high school) I can assure you that the logistics are not impossible. The school district I drove for did it in the midst of desegregation and extremely lengthy busing for racial balancing.