The doctors of the Children’s Clinical University Hospital (BKUS) also joined his call.
Ombudsman Juris Jansons believes that such changes have so far been prevented by the lack of understanding of the impact of a full-fledged sleep on the child’s health, development and behavior, including in the responsible ministries.
In Janson’s view, the preferred scenario would be for primary school classes to start at 8:30 a.m., and in secondary schools – from 9 a.m. At the moment, the state does not set the start time for educational institutions, so schools have freedom of action in this matter, the ombudsman notes.
Laila Grävere, Head of the Children’s Rights Department of the Ombudsman’s Office, emphasizes that too early a start time for schooling, especially for teenagers, can affect their right to full sleep, health and development. “Therefore, one of our recommendations to the Cabinet of Ministers is to develop such guidelines for local governments, parents and students that would promote understanding of the importance of sleep in child development and the determination of the starting time of schooling that would meet the children’s best interests,” says Grävere.
Representatives of the BKUS Center for Epilepsy and Sleep Medicine explain that sleep is a vital process for survival, just like a healthy diet or breathing. Sleep plays an important role in memory formation, emotion processing and brain development, notes BKUS.
The hospital states that insufficient or poor-quality sleep can affect the child’s psycho-emotional and physical health, as well as impair success and success in the learning process.
BKUS calls for special attention to be paid to the right of teenagers to a full-fledged sleep. The hospital states that various changes occur in the functioning of the brain during adolescence, for example, the release of melatonin is delayed, which is why a young person feels sleepy later than an adult. These changes in the brain, along with environmental and psychosocial factors, can lead to insomnia or delayed sleep-wake syndrome.
On the other hand, an insufficient amount of sleep can adversely affect brain functioning, in which the student may not be able to control emotions, notes BKUS. This, in turn, can contribute to psychological or psychiatric problems that further impair sleep. Based on experience and scientific evidence, the sleep specialists of BKUS Epilepsy and Sleep Medicine Center strongly support a later school start for teenagers.
The decision to set the beginning of school time at 8:30 a.m. in primary schools and at 9:00 a.m. for secondary school-aged children would be a big step in ensuring the health of young people, the hospital says.
The ombudsman notes that in the inspection case he evaluated what the responsible ministries have done to improve children’s right to a full sleep, how the start time of school affects children’s health and whether changes in laws are necessary.
The office states that the answers provided by the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education and Science show that the establishment of the earliest acceptable time for the start of uniform lessons in the country is hindered by the lack of understanding of the impact of adequate sleep on a child’s health, development and behavior.
The Ministry of Health has stated that it “still believes that each person is individual and each has their own individual biological rhythms, [..] and would like to emphasize again that no uniform starting time of school time can fully meet the needs and biological rhythms of all students.”
Both ministries prioritize the needs of educational institutions and parents, which is against the best interests of the child, in the matter of the starting time of educational institutions, the office states.
This is not the first time that the ombudsman brings up the issue of the start time of lessons – in 2017, the ombudsman appealed to both ministries and called on educational institutions to determine the earliest allowable time for the start of lessons.
The office states that the ombudsman’s recommendations are closely in line with the results of a survey of parents of students regarding the start time of classes in schools and how students get to school. Evaluating the responses given in the survey, it was concluded that the earlier the child has to go to school, the more often the parents acknowledged the influence on the child’s learning process in the survey.
For example, parents most often indicated their dissatisfaction with the amount of sleep their child gets when the child has to get up between 5 am and 5:59 am (65%-70%). On the other hand, dissatisfaction is most rarely expressed in the questionnaires, which admit that the child gets up between 7 and 7.59 (22%-24%).
In the opinion of the ombudsman, the start of school hours should be such that it would allow children of all ages to be woken up no earlier than 7 o’clock.
BKUS has also indicated the average number of hours that children and young people need for full sleep – from seven to 13 years old it is nine to 11 hours, and from 14 to 18 years old – eight to ten hours.
The office notes that experience shows that it can be easier for parents to motivate small, primary school-age children to go to bed on time than it is for teenagers – these are developmental features of each age. Therefore, in the opinion of the ombudsman, it would be desirable to ensure the beginning of lessons that take these objective factors into account.
On the other hand, in the opinion of the ombudsman, it is desirable for parents to evaluate whether the child should study in an educational institution located far from his place of residence. That is, whether the time spent on the road every day allows the child to ensure sufficient rest and the necessary hours of sleep. According to the office, this applies only to those cases in which the student has the opportunity to study at an educational institution closer to his place of residence.