If you work in a school district where middle or high schools start before 8:30a, you probably already know that’s neither a recommended best practice nor a healthy practice for teens. Are you ready to do something good and get to better school start times (SSTs) for your students? Remember, even if you are the superintendent, you won’t get your district to change by yourself. You need to be able to count. You need a majority of the school board plus one internal champion among district staff.
One of Prismatic’s clients was Anne Arundel County Public Schools in Maryland (~85,000 students). They successfully moved to an 8:30a start for their high schools and a 9:15a start for their middle schools in 2022-23. While it was ultimately a success story, it was not an overnight success story. There was local support for changing SSTs for years, but it was not until a majority of the board committed to it that it became possible to push beyond the objections of a former superintendent and transportation department leadership. The school board adopted a directive that essentially said, “just do it.” Even with that, it would not have been possible for Anne Arundel to successfully roll out new SSTs had they not had an incredible COO who understood the assignment to “just do it.” He was truly a champion for the work and part of the critical star alignment.
On the flip side, another Prismatic client had a majority of the school board plus an internal champion in the transportation director in 2023. The stars aligned and they hired us to figure out transportation options for their more than 180,000 students. Then the stars began to fall. In November 2023 elections, a majority of the school board turned over. The transportation director retired. Going into 2024, most of the new board members were only lukewarm and/or unconvinced about healthier SSTs. District leadership didn’t really want to make a change. In multiple instances, key tasks were pushed aside by staff for other district priorities. The superintendent never stated she was in favor of doing the work to make healthier SSTs happen. Publicly, district leaders said they would support the change if it could be done at “minimal fiscal impact.” However, when provided with multiple transportation solutions that met those criteria, they came up with new, non-transportation concerns. The stars fell to earth, unaligned, and the effort died.
The moral of both stories is that you have to learn how to count, the stars must align, and the stars must stay aligned until the new SSTs are implemented. If you don’t have those things, you won’t get to healthier SSTs. If your stars align, move as fast as possible, before they fall out of alignment.
And if your stars are not aligned? Your 1st step is to get them aligned. Smart, open-minded school board members and superintendents can be educated on the physical health, mental health, and academic benefits of later SSTs for middle/high school students. Just ask the current superintendent of Anne Arundel how beneficial his secondary SSTs are in winning state sports titles. Smart, open-minded board members and superintendents can become advocates. And if they don’t? The average tenure of a school district superintendent is just 3 years. School board elections happen regularly. If you can’t turn the current leaders into advocates, advocate for new leaders.
