Want Improved Academic and Sports Performance, Plus Healthier Kids? Start School Later

“If I offered a medicine that would decrease the risk of injury, improve academic and sports performance, and allow maximal normal growth, with the side effects of a lower risk of obesity and improved mood in your teen – all for free – who wouldn’t come get that pill? We have access to that medicine right now: adequate sleep for teens!” - Pediatrician and sports-medicine trained physician Lucien R. Ouellette, M.D. on why we need to start school later.

In Baltimore County, thousands of our students are on the bus in the 6am hour. These hours are incompatible with known sleep patterns of teenagers, most of whom need about 8.5-9.5 hours of sleep a night. Physiology limits most adolescent’s ability to fall asleep much before 11 p.m., regardless of homework and extracurricular demands or electronic distractions.

Start School Later – Baltimore County is encouraging the BCPS Board to recognize the large and compelling body of research demonstrating how early school start times negatively impact children’s academic achievement and physical and mental health and thus shift transportation and start times to align with students’ physiology, following the recommendations of parents, our county’s students, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the CDC, and the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. Please join us at https://www.facebook.com/groups/SSLBaltimoreCountyMD, where you will also find a link for our petition. Help make BCPS healthy for our students!

60?\v_