While even a 20-minute shift could reap benefits, Dr. Wolfson said, if it was within the 7 o'clock hour, it would still be too early to make much difference. Nowhere is it immediately popular to propose making it easier for teen-agers to sleep in. To put it mildly, that is an unusual public policy goal. University of Minnesota researchers likened a change to later start times to such traumatic shifts as closing a school or changing the area a school serves. Opponents argue that later start times increase the need for child care in the morning and, with classes ending late, decrease the time available for after-school activities and jobs.
Teachers often resent being released into the middle of traffic jams.
In many instances, practical considerations win out. In particular, she said, many school board members thought students' high SAT scores and the many acceptances at prestigious colleges suggested things were fine as they were. But the sleep research of Professor Carskadon and others was still an important part of the debate. A task force appointed by the school board made an extensive study of the research and polled parents, who, like counterparts elsewhere, generally supported later starting bells if they could be proved to help children. They also studied the tangled, potentially costly logistics of transportation and after-school athletics.