OUR TURN: Students (and parents) losing sleep over MFISD’s early hours

By now the Marble Falls Independent School District has had a few months to determine whether earlier class hours for the elementary schools are working.

They aren’t.

These oh-dark-thirty times are not beneficial to parents or their children — especially those in kindergarten, many of whom are losing valuable sleep.

Parents say their youngest kids have to be up and dressed by 6:30 a.m. to be ready for the bus. Other parents who choose to drive the kids to campus must scramble to avoid a tardy.

The School Board is urged to work with new Superintendent Rob O’Connor and to convince the administration to rethink the elementary campus operating hours.

Next year the district should either resurrect the former family-friendly schedule of the 2010-2011 academic year or come up with another solution.

The earlier school hours started in August after Dr. Jim Boyle, an interim superintendent, tried to stop the district’s financial bleeding.

Boyle wanted to save $93,000 by taking seven buses off the road. By creating earlier start times, and readjusting dismissal times in the afternoon, he reasoned the district could avoid layoffs and save wear and tear on the buses.

He and other administrators feared deep cuts ordered by the Legislature to state education funding could severely hamper the district, so he looked for savings.

While Boyle’s goals were laudable, it is hundreds of parents and their children who now pay the unfair cost of lost sleep and lost family time. (Not to mention the school staff who have to get up even earlier to be on campus.)

But here’s some food for thought.

The district added more than $800,000 to its fund balance at the end of the 2010-2011 fiscal year after entering that budget anticipating a $300,000 shortfall. The savings programs appear to be working, so why not return to the previous hours? The district has shown it knows how to move money around, so why not find enough to make up for the transportation costs?

Under the earlier hours, the district’s elementary schools — Colt, Highland Lakes, Marble Falls and Spicewood — start at 7:45 a.m., which is 15 minutes earlier than the previous start time of 8 a.m.

Even worse, students at Marble Falls Elementary have a 7:35 a.m. assembly in the gym, creating even more of a hardship. They are considered late if they arrive by 7:45 a.m., and families are pressured to be there 10 minutes earlier. (Though Boyle did not institute these hours, they remain onerous).

The new start times allow buses to double up at the secondary level, officials have argued.

But the new hours are taking a toll. Pediatricians are already warning that American children do not get enough sleep.

Children 3-6 need 10-12 hours of rest each night, doctors say. And children 7-12 require 10-11 hours.

But this new schedule cuts into that valuable rest time, especially for working parents. If you take into account that an average workday for mom and dad ends at 5-6 p.m., factor in students doing at least an hour of homework a night, add the element of older brothers and sisters ferried to and from practice and school activities, allow time for dinner and remember that church, shopping and other pursuits also take place in the evening, then it becomes highly likely the new campus hours are causing hardships for many folks.

No matter what, there must be other ways to trim costs without compromising the rest children need and the time families should be spending together.

Working together, O’Connor and the School Board can arrive at a solution.