With all the debate over whether high schools should open later in the morning because children’s sleeping patterns change as they become teenagers, I got curious as to how long my fellow Dopers had to stay in school each day. From when I was in eighth grade to tenth grade (I suppose that’s third through fifth form for those in the British or a British influenced educational system), school began at 8:15 and ended at 3:15, most days. However, we had a six day rotating system, and every seven school days school would end at 2:30 so the teachers could have a special meaning. In 11th grade, they added a seventh day, changed around a bunch of stuff, and made the day half-an-hour longer (8:00-3:30). I’ve heard some students have to be in at 7:30 now :eek:, and it seems like kids are getting out earlier–when I go to the deli around 2:30, it’s full of teenagers.
Here, we have 0-6 hours for underclassmen. Upperclassmen, seniors, can take a minimum of four classes, and I’m taking five. 0-4.
I get to school at 6:15 and go home at 11:30; if I had the rest of the classes I’d go home at 2:10.
When I was in high school, about five years ago, class started at 7:35 and went until 2:35 except on thursdays when we got out at 1:40. This didn’t count if you had a leave-early where you could leave at sixth or seventh period, or an arrive-late where you could come after first and possibly second period. Arrive-lates and Leave-earlies were only availible to upper classmen, though. Freshman and Sophmores were out of luck.
We just changed from 8:30 til 3:00 to 8:05 to 3:10. I may be off by 5 minutes or so. What’s that, you say, they moved it EARLIER? Yes. Long story. I have a pit thread about it somewhere.
My high school (1998-2001) went from 7:55am to 3:15pm. Four classes, roughly 90 minutes long, with about three minutes between classes.
Mom of middle schoolers checking in. Their school day starts a t 7:10 and ends at 2:20. They have to get up very early in the morning to be ready for the bus at 6:20. They arrive home around 3ish. As a result, they must be in bed by 9 or they are very, very cranky the next day.
This was one of the essay questions that the board of Ed in a state that shall remain nameless assigned their 11th graders last year (Not quite as hated as lawyers, I’m one of those people who evaluates standarized tests.) Surprisingly over 3/4ths of kids were on the con side of the debate. Boy do they hate the idea of anything messing with the hours they can practice sports or work…
Anyway, my school hours were 7:20am to 2:10pm while in high school from 1991-5. No one but the elementary school kids started as late as 8am.
I went to three different high schools, '90-'95. Two (in Alabama and New Mexico) started at 8ish and went to 3ish. The one in Texas started at 7:30 and went to 2:30.
I teach in a Texas High School and we go from 8:45 to 3:45. This has less to do with accomadating teenage sleep patterns and more to do with spacing out elementary/ middle/ high school start times help make bus usage efficient.
As a teach, I kinda like the late start time because I am such an extreme morning person. I get to school by 6:30 and have the building to myself for an hour or so. Since my planning period is 1st, I do’nt actually start teaching til 9:30. The downside is that I teach straight through from then until 3:45 with only a 25 minute lunch.
My high school hours were:
9am to 10:20
then a 20 minute break
10:40 to noon
lunch hour
1pm to 2:20pm
5 minute break
2:25pm to 3:45pm
Incidentally, this is a Scottish high school (ages 12+)
In junior high (grades 7 through 9; now middle school, which covers grades 6-8) we had seven classes, which each ran 50 minutes. Between second and third periods we had a ten-minute break. Lunch ran 45 minutes and was between fifth and sixth periods. IIRC, we started at about 8:00 AM and were released at 3:00 P.M.
By the time I got to high school we only had six class periods, plus a ten-minute break in the morning (between periods 2 and 3) and lunch, between periods 4 and 5. The lunch was longer, as we had an open campus and could leave during lunch, giving us more time to go out and eat away from the school. This cut the day to around 6 1/2 hours.
In my sophomore and junior years in high school we ran on a split schedule. This was an effort to alleviate overcrowding as our district was in desparate need of a new high school and several attempts at passing a bond had failed. Because of the split schedule, juniors and seniors started at around 7:30 A.M. and were dismissed at 2:00 P.M., whereas the sophomores didn’t start until 10:30 A.M., but were in class until 5:00 P.M. (freshmen still went to the junior high school at the time). While some of my classmates enjoyed getting to sleep in a little later, I liked to start my day early and get out of class earlier. 5:00 was too late in the afternoon for me to sit in class. By the time I was a senior a new high school had been built and the split class system was no longer needed. IIRC we all were back to 8:00 A.M. to 2:30 P.M.
School for me started at 8:30AM and finished at 3:20PM, and in all but my last two years the day was broken up into eight 40-minute periods with a twenty minute break and an hour. When I was in years 12 and 13 (Form 6 and 7) they changed it into nine 35-minute periods, with breaks of five minutes, fifteen minutes and an hour (I think).
It’s an international school using the British curriculum.
Current High School teacher in Southern California. We start each day at 7:30am, and run 4 90-minutes periods, with breaks, to dismiss at 2:40pm. I fight any effort to start the day later. Screw “teenage sleep patterns!” Adapt od die is the way the world works. I refuse to coddle the little &5#@*%. 
My high school day went from 9am to 3:30pm. Four classes of 72 mins (or 8 of 38 mins for 7-9), with a half-day roughly once a month. However, my last year, due to various issues, the start of the day was pushed back to 9:15 because the days were longer than we needed. Which made no sense because the busing schedule was the same, so we were at school for the same amount of time. There were literally people getting to school an hour before classes begun [/rant]
If you had a free period first or last class (10-12 only), then you could arrive late or leave early. This generally required a personal vehicule, though, and our parking lot was nowhere near as big as it needed to be. I am so glad to be out of there.
When I was in high school (1990-1994), we started at 7:30 and ended at 3:15. Our classes were set up in blocks, so each one was 2 and 1/2 hours long with 3.5 classes per day (the .5 class was study hall) and class schedules would rotate - one day you would have certain classes and the next day you’d have a different set. Most of us wound up staying until 4 anyway because a lot of the classes would run over their time limit.
When I was in school (class of '70), the day was 8:30 to 3:15. It was pretty much the same for high school and elementary school.
For the first three years of HS, there were eight periods plus lunch. My senior year, they changed to seven slightly longer periods.
Seems like we went from about 7:45 to 2:50, with about 25 minutes for lunch. I also think there was a 5 minute “break” sometime in the afternoon but I’m fuzzy on that.
If high schools started class at, say, 10:00 and went to, oh, 4 (you’d have to have block scheduling, of course) I’m willing to wager almost every kid’s grades would improve. 8:00am is too early for a teenager to try to learn algebra!
When I was in high school, we walked three miles uphill through ten feet of snow in our underwear every day…
Sorry : )
Seriously though–I usually got up at seven o’clock to get there by nine for the opening anthem (a static-crackly version of ‘O Canada’ warbled by a really bad country singer) and announcements; the day ended usually at 3:30 p.m. after four lo-o-o-ong periods of 70 minutes and an hour-long lunch.
This makes… six and a half hours, right?
My school day seems very different from most. It begins at 8.30, but lessons don’t start till 9.15. I don’t get out till 4.00!
To further complicate it, I get Wednesday afternoons off, but that’s a sixth form privilege only.
Wow, you started early!
My elementary school started at 8:55 and ran til about 3-3:15, depending on which bus group you were on…due to the organization of the school board, some buses had to drive a load of elementary kids and then pick up the high school kids later. Others began at the high school and then picked up the little kids at the elementary school before beginning the LONG drives out to the small towns which made up the “regional” part of the school board and high school name!
I understand things have changed, but my high school experience was like this, back in 1993 to 1998, (grades 7-11). We were on a six day rotating cycle, with 7-9 classes per year, depending on how many 4-day and 6-day courses you had (more 4-days led to having an extra 2-ady (out of six) class). There were 6 blocks (Classes) per day, 50 minutes each, plus lunch.
Homeroom began at 9:00 sharp, and ended at 9:10. Technically, the next class started at 9:10 (though all teachers allowed 5 minutes to get to class) and ran until 10:00. We then had a 15 minute break. The next two classes were 10:15 to 11:05, and then 11:05 to 11:55. Lunch was the 50 minutes from 11:55 to 12:45, and then we had three back-to-back classes until 3:20, when we took the bus home.
We never had short days, nor were we allowed to schedule spares, unless you’d taken a bunch of classes a year early or something (which was rare) and you honestly couldn’t fit in the Community Service course (essentially a spare 99.99% of the time) and a Home Economics one. I ended up doing both of those in my last year (got a 100$ award in home ec…easiest money ever earned!)
9.00 – 11.00
15 mins break
11.15 – 1.15
1 hour break
2.15 – 4.15
Off at 1.15 on Weds. for after school activities Rugby etc. If you didn’t play sports you went home.