By Bryan Simo, Staff Writer
Last school year, The Howard County Board of Education announced that they would be changing high school start times from 7:25 AM to 8:00 AM and pushing back the end times from 2:10 PM to 2:45 PM. In September, The Board provided an update to start and end times, pushing them back ten minutes to accommodate for the issue of late buses. After living with the major shift for almost two months, how are River Hill students feeling about the start times? Have feelings changed since the beginning of the year?
“I’ve just kinda gotten used to it,” says senior Sarah Chin. Having experienced both start times, she thinks that “it was an easy change to get used to,” and other students agree. Senior Lily Peng, adds “At this point I don’t really even notice… maybe at the beginning of the year but now it’s normal,” so overall it seems like the novelty of the change has worn off for most people. Junior Max Deilius says, “I was excited at first, but now it’s just whatever.” Despite the overwhelming feeling of indifference from the student body, Senior Rahul Manchanda believes “this was the best thing to happen this year,” claiming that the change in times allows him to go to sleep later, which brings up a good point. How has this change affected student’s sleeping habits?
“I go to bed a little later compared to last year,” says senior Zayan Foyez. “Starting [school] later lets me justify it” he explains. But others disagree, senior Shreyas Bhargava says “I go to bed at the same time as last year and it’s nice because I get a little extra sleep” but unfortunately for Shreyas, he says he “[doesn’t] really feel the extra sleep anymore” because he’s used to it, a sentiment which people seem to agree with. “Sounds about right,” senior JJ Salter adds to Shreyas’ remarks.
Given the response from the students of River Hill, it seems like the student body has grown accustomed to this year’s start times, so when teased with the idea of reverting back to the old start time, the overwhelming response was a no. “I would cry,” laughs senior Tegan Alewine. “Nope, can’t do that” claims sophomore Siri Aria. And senior Daniel Murakami simply exclaimed, “NO!” It’s safe to say that everyone is happy with the new times as is.