Thursday, Dec. 23, 2004 | 4:06 a.m.
WEEKEND EDITION
December 24 - 26, 2004
I wonder if anyone else sees holes in state Sen. Bob Beers' reasoning in regard to a later start time for high school students. Mr. Beers states, "Teenagers don't perform well early in the morning." He goes on to say that we expect them to learn "at the time of day when they're at their worst."
In her story on Beers' proposal for an earlier start time, the Sun's Emily Richmond reported that Beers' own daughter, who is in high school, goes to bed at 8 p.m. and rises at 4 a.m. to do her homework. Isn't that "early in the morning" and a time when teens are "at their worst"? We should always put our ideas into practice before we begin imposing them on others, shouldn't we?
As a teacher for 39 years, I always found that my remedial students performed better in my first-period class than those I had later in the day. By the way, I base that conclusion on their grades in my class and the high percentage who passed the reading and writing proficiency exams.
JOAN SHRINER
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