Sleep-Deprived Teens Dozing Off at School

I'm amazed this is still news. I see reports on this all the time, and they hardly ever say anything new. This article actually says less than a couple others I've read. I didn't think that there was such a dearth of news that reporters had to cover the same stories with the same facts over and over again.

In high school I was sleeping 8 hours or so and still falling asleep -- what does that say about me? :D

In high school I was taking a full load of classes (9 classes my junior year, 8 all other years), participating in at least two choirs, active in theatre, a leading member of our speech team, and technical director for our school auditorium (and, before you ask, yes, I still wasn't given preferential registration). With homework added to the mix I was getting to bed around 1am every night and waking up at 6:30am every morning. It was awful. My junior year I literally could not keep my eyes open half the time in my Physics class (I had a cool teacher - so it worked out). Pushing start times back to 9am or later and not allowing school events to go past 11pm would make a huge difference.

ironically, the days i got 5 hours of sleep were the days i was not as sleepy. my days usually consisted of waking up around 530-615 and bed around 1200-100. usually those days involved 2.5 hr track/xc practice and 1.5 hr swim practice. on nights days that i didn't have swim, i usually worked on art or design projects.

i also skipped a lot of my classes to goto the art room and work...so i guess i could also say instead of becoming bored, i would go motivate myself in the subjects i did enjoy at the cost of not participating in the other.

I am on the same page as you gleuch. I would get around 5-6 a night and would feel fine but the nights I got to bed early and got around 7-9 hours of sleep I couldn't pay attention at all and kept zoning out during my classes.

"Sending students to school without enough sleep is like sending them to school without breakfast."

What is this breakfast thing you speak of?

Everyone has different sleep needs. Some people need nine, some need six hours of sleep per night.

My problem now is an on and off insomnia. Sometimes I just can't get to sleep. When I was in high school, however, I was definitely out like a light every night... it was awesome.