爲保學生睡眠 美國中學推遲上課大綱
COLUMBIA, Mo. – Jilly Dos Santos really did try to get to school on time. She set three successive alarms on her phone. Skipped breakfast. Hastily applied makeup while her fuming father drove. But last year she rarely made it into the frantic scrum at the doors of Rock Bridge High School here by the first bell, at 7:50 a.m.
密蘇里州哥倫比亞市—爲了按時到校，吉莉·多斯桑托斯(Jilly Dos Santos)已經使盡了渾身解數。她在手機上連着設了三個鬧鐘，早餐也顧不上吃，在父親氣沖沖駕車的途中匆匆化妝。但即使這樣，去年她幾乎也從未成功在早上7:50預備鈴響之前衝進石橋高中(Rock Bridge High School)大門口蜂擁的學生羣中。
Then she heard that the school board was about to make the day start even earlier, at 7:20 a.m.
然後她聽說，學校董事會正準備將上課時間提前到7:20。
“I thought, if that happens, I will die,” recalled Jilly, 17. “I will drop out of school!”
“我想要真這樣我就死定了，”17歲的吉莉回憶道。“我會輟學的！”
That was when the sleep-deprived teenager turned into a sleep activist. She was determined to convince the board of a truth she knew in the core of her tired, lanky body: Teenagers are developmentally driven to be late to bed, late to rise. Could the board realign the first bell with that biological reality?
就是從這時候起，這名總是睡眠不足的少女變身爲睡眠捍衛者。她決心要說服學校董事會，使他們也認識到她那疲憊、瘦高的身體一再告訴她的真相：青少年正處在生長髮育階段，這注定了他們就是要晚睡晚起。學校董事會能不能根據這個生物學上的事實重新調整預備鈴的時間？
The sputtering, nearly 20-year movement to start high schools later has recently gained momentum in communities like this one, as hundreds of schools in dozens of districts across the country have bowed to the accumulating research on the adolescent body clock.
近20年來，試圖推遲高中上課時間的運動一直進展得不溫不火。但近來，日積月累的青少年生物鐘研究逐漸得到全美各地幾十個學區中的數百所學校的普遍認同，就像吉莉所在的社區這樣，該活動的發展勢頭也隨之改善。
In just the last two years, high schools in Long Beach, Calif.; Stillwater, Okla.; Decatur, Ga.;, and Glens Falls, N.Y., have pushed back their first bells, joining early adopters in Connecticut, North Carolina, Kentucky and Minnesota. The Seattle school board will vote this month on whether to pursue the issue. The superintendent of Montgomery County, Md., supports the shift, and the school board for Fairfax County, Va., is working with consultants to develop options for starts after 8 a.m.
僅僅在剛剛過去的兩年中，繼康涅狄格州、北卡羅來納州、肯塔基州和明尼蘇達州這些先行者之後，加州長灘、俄克拉何馬州斯蒂爾沃特市、佐治亞州迪凱特市以及紐約州格倫斯福爾斯市的高中也推遲了他們預備鈴的時間。西雅圖的學校董事會這個月將就是否跟進該議題進行投票。馬里蘭州蒙哥馬利縣的學監支持這一轉變，弗吉尼亞州費爾法克斯縣學校董事會也正在與顧問商議制定早晨8點以後再開始上課的作息方案。
New evidence suggests that later high school starts have widespread benefits. Researchers at the University of Minnesota, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, studied eight high schools in three states before and after they moved to later start times in recent years. In results released Wednesday they found that the later a school’s start time, the better off the students were on many measures, including mental health, car crash rates, attendance and, in some schools, grades and standardized test scores.
新的證據表明，推遲高中上課時間可以帶來廣泛的效益。在美國疾病控制和預防中心(Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)的資助下，美國明尼蘇達大學(University of Minnesota)的科學家們研究了三個州的八所高中在近幾年推遲上課時間的前後，學生們出現了哪些變化。他們在週三公佈的研究結果顯示：高中上課時間越晚，學生們在諸多指標（心理健康、車禍率、出勤率等，在某些學校裏甚至還包括成績和標準化考試分數）方面的改善越大。
Dr. Elizabeth Miller, chief of adolescent medicine at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, who was not involved in the research, noted that the study was not a randomized controlled trial, which would have compared schools that had changed times with similar schools that had not. But she said its methods were pragmatic and its findings promising.
未參與這項研究的匹茲堡兒童醫院青少年醫學部負責人伊麗莎白·米勒(Elizabeth Miller)博士指出，該研究並非隨機對照試驗——按照隨機對照試驗的設計要求，應是將改變了作息時間的學校與未進行此類改變的同類學校進行比較。但她承認該方法較實用，其研究結果大有前途。
“Even schools with limited resources can make this one policy change with what appears to be benefits for their students,” Dr. Miller said.
“即使學校的資源有限，也不妨礙他們實施這一有益於學生的政策改革，”米勒博士說。
Researchers have found that during adolescence, as hormones surge and the brain develops, teenagers who regularly sleep eight to nine hours a night learn better and are less likely to be tardy, get in fights or sustain athletic injuries. Sleeping well can also help moderate their tendency toward impulsive or risky decision-making.
研究人員發現，在青春期，青少年體內激素激增，大腦發育，他們在每夜日常睡眠達八到九個小時時學習效果較好，也較不容易遲到、打架或經常發生運動傷害。良好的睡眠也可以幫助減少他們冒失衝動或做出冒險決定。
During puberty, teenagers have a later release of the “sleep” hormone melatonin, which means they tend not to feel drowsy until around 11 p.m. That inclination can be further delayed by the stimulating blue light from electronic devices, which tricks the brain into sensing wakeful daylight, slowing the release of melatonin and the onset of sleep. The Minnesota study noted that 88 percent of the students kept a cellphone in their bedroom.
青春期期間，“睡眠”激素——褪黑激素的釋放有所延遲，這意味着青少年們往往直到晚上11點左右纔會覺得昏昏欲睡。電子設備發出的藍光會誤導人的大腦，使其以爲感覺到了干擾入睡的日光，在此刺激下，褪黑激素的釋放進一步受到延緩，睡意就愈發姍姍來遲。明尼蘇達大學的研究指出，88%的學生都在臥室裏放有手機。
But many parents, and some students, object to shifting the start of the day later. They say doing so makes sports practices end late, jeopardizes student jobs, bites into time for homework and extracurricular activities, and upsets the morning routine for working parents and younger children.
不過許多家長以及一些學生都反對推遲上課時間。他們認爲，這樣體育鍛煉就得拖到很晚才能結束，影響學生打工，侵佔做家庭作業和從事課外活動的時間，還會擾亂需要工作的父母和年齡較小的孩子們早晨的時間安排。
At heart, though, experts say, the resistance is driven by skepticism about the primacy of sleep.
不過，專家表示，從本質上來說，會產生這種抗拒思維是因爲他們對睡眠的重要意義持懷疑態度。
“It’s still a badge of honor to get five hours of sleep,” said Dr. Judith Owens, a sleep expert at the Children’s National Medical Center in Washington. “It supposedly means you’re working harder, and that’s a good thing. So there has to be a cultural shift around sleep.”
“人們仍然覺得應該給每晚睡五個小時的人頒發勞模獎章，”全美兒童醫療中心（Children’s National Medical Center，位於華盛頓）的睡眠專家朱迪絲·歐文斯(Judith Owens)博士說。“大家都想當然地以爲這表示工作比較拼命，值得讚揚。因此，要爲推遲上學時間爭取更多的支持，就必須從文化層面入手，轉變人們的睡眠觀。”
Last January, Jilly decided she would try to make that change happen in the Columbia school district, which sprawls across 300 square miles of flatland, with 18,000 students and 458 bus routes. But before she could make the case for a later bell, she had to show why an earlier one just would not do.
去年1月，吉莉下定決心，她要想辦法讓哥倫比亞學區作出這樣的改變，而該校區綿延300多公里，涉及1.8萬名學生和458條公交路線。但在說明推遲上課時間的充分理由之前，她還得向大家解釋清楚爲何上課太早不夠合理。
She got the idea in her team-taught Advanced Placement world history class, which explores the role of leadership. Students were urged to find a contemporary topic that ignited their passion. One morning, the teachers mentioned that a school board committee had recommended an earlier start time to solve logistical problems in scheduling bus routes. The issue would be discussed at a school board hearing in five days. If you do not like it, the teachers said, do something.
吉莉最早產生這個念頭，是在以小組協同教學方式進行的大學先修課程(Advanced Placement)世界史的課堂上。這堂課探討的是領導力的作用。老師們鼓勵學生從當代尋找一個足以點燃他們激情的課題。一天早晨，老師們提到學校董事會的委員會建議提前上課時間，以解決調度公交線路的後勤問題。學校董事會將於五天內召開聽證會對這一提議進行討論。老師們提醒學生：如果你不喜歡這樣，那就用行動來表達你的意願。
Jilly did the ugly math: A first bell at 7:20 a.m. meant she would have to wake up at 6 a.m.
吉莉發現了一個可怕的問題：早晨7:20打預備鈴就意味着她將不得不在早晨6點起牀。
She had found her passion.
她覺得自己已經找到動力和激情了。
She seemed an unlikely choice to halt what was almost a done deal. She was just a sophomore, and did not particularly relish conflict. But Jilly, the youngest of seven children, had learned to be independent early on: Her mother died when she was 9.
吉莉看起來並不像是要撼動一項基本上已經板上釘釘的決議的適當人選。她只是個高二學生，也不喜歡跟人爭論。不過，作爲家中七個孩子中年齡最小的一個，九歲喪母的她很早就學會了自立。
And she is energetic and forthright. That year, she had interned on a voter turnout drive for Missouri Democrats, volunteered in a French-immersion prekindergarten class, written for the student newspaper, worked at a fast-food pizza restaurant and maintained an A average in French, Spanish and Latin.
她性格直率，總是一副精力充沛的模樣。儘管她那年參與了很多課外活動：在拉高密蘇里民主黨投票率的活動中實習，在幼兒園學前班的沉浸式法語教育課程中擔任志願者，爲學生報紙撰稿，在快餐比薩店打工等等，但她的法語、西班牙語和拉丁語成績都一直保持在A的水平。
“It’s about time management,” she explained one recent afternoon, curled up in an armchair at home.
“時間管理是關鍵，”最近的一個下午，她蜷縮在家中的扶手椅上，這樣解釋道。
That Wednesday, she pulled an all-nighter. She created a Facebook page and set up a Twitter account, alerting hundreds of students about the school board meeting: “Be there to have a say in your school district’s decisions on school start times!”
那一週的週三，她熬了個通宵，創建了一個Facebook頁面和一個Twitter帳戶，提醒數百名學生關注學校董事會的會議：“如果你對所在學區的上課時間決策有自己的看法，請出席會議併發言！”
She then got in touch with Start School Later, a noNPRofit group that provided her with scientific ammunition. She recruited friends and divided up sleep-research topics. With a blast of emails, she tried to enlist the help of every high school teacher in the district. She started an online petition.
然後，她與非營利性組織“推遲上課時間”(Start School Later)取得了聯繫，並從該組織獲得了所需的科學依據。她招募友人與她分擔睡眠研究課題，併發出大量電子郵件，盡力爭取該學區內每一位高中老師的幫助。她還在網上發起了請願活動。
The students she organized made hundreds of posters and fliers, and posted advice on Twitter: “If you are going to be attending the board meeting tomorrow we recommend that you dress up!”
在她的組織下，同學們製作了上百張的海報和宣傳單，並在Twitter上張貼建議：“如果你要出席明天的董事會會議，建議你穿上正裝！”
The testy school board meeting that Monday was packed. Jilly, wearing a demure, ruffled white blouse and skirt, addressed the board, blinking owl-like. The dignitaries’ faces were a blur to her because while nervously rubbing her eyes, she had removed her contact lenses. But she spoke coolly about the adolescent sleep cycle: “You know, kids don’t want to get up,” she said. “I know I don’t. Biologically, we’ve looked into that.”
那個週一，學校董事會會議座無虛席。吉莉身着端莊的褶邊白襯衫和裙子在董事會面前侃侃而談。她像貓頭鷹似的不停地眨眼睛，因爲她看不清那些“大人物”的臉——她的隱形眼鏡在她因緊張而揉眼睛時被她揉掉了。但在談到青少年的睡眠週期時，她顯得十分冷靜：“大家都知道，孩子們喜歡賴牀，”她說。“我知道我就不想起牀。於是我們從生物學角度上探討了一下這個問題。”
The board heatedly debated the issue and decided against the earlier start time.
學校董事會展開了激烈的辯論，最後決定反對提前上課時間。
The next day Jilly turned to campaigning for a later start time, joining a movement that has been gaining support. A 2011 report by the Brookings Institution recommended later start times for high schools, and last summer Arne Duncan, the secretary of education, posted his endorsement of the idea on Twitter.
第二天，吉莉轉戰下一個目標：投身於“爭取推遲上課時間”這一日益獲得人們支持的運動中去。2011年，布魯金斯學會(Brookings Institution)發佈報告建議高中推遲上課時間。去年夏天，美國教育部長阿恩·鄧肯(Arne Duncan)在Twitter上發言表達了贊同意見。
The University of Minnesota study tracked 9,000 high school students in five districts in Colorado, Wyoming and Minnesota before and after schools shifted start times. In those that originally started at 7:30 a.m., only a third of students said they were able to get eight or more hours of sleep. Students who got less than that reported significantly more symptoms of depression, and greater use of caffeine, alcohol and illegal drugs than better-rested peers.
明尼蘇達大學的研究跟蹤了科羅拉多州、懷俄明州和明尼蘇達州五個學區的9000名高中生，並對學校改變上課時間前後他們的各種情況進行了比較。在原本早晨7:30開始上課的學校中，只有三分之一的學生表示可以保證至少八小時的睡眠。與可以得到較好休息的同學們相比，睡眠時間低於上述時間的學生報告的抑鬱症症狀顯著較多，含咖啡因食品、酒類及非法藥物的攝入量也顯著較大。
“It’s biological — the mental health outcomes were identical from inner-city kids and affluent kids,” said Kyla Wahlstrom, a professor of educational research at the University of Minnesota and the lead author of the study.
“這是生物學機理決定的——無論是來自貧民區的孩子還是富庶家庭的孩子，這些心理健康結果都一致，”明尼蘇達大學的教育研究教授、該研究的主要作者凱拉·瓦爾斯特龍(Kyla Wahlstrom)指出。
In schools that now start at 8:35 a.m., nearly 60 percent of students reported getting eight hours of sleep nightly.
在現在改爲早晨8:35上課的學校裏，近60%的學生都報告每晚能睡足八小時。
In 2012, the high school in Jackson, Wyo., moved the first bell to 8:55 a.m. from 7:35 a.m. During that academic year, car crashes by drivers 16 to 18 years old dropped to seven from 23 the year before. Academic results improved, though not across the board.
2012年，懷俄明州傑克遜市的高中將預備鈴時間從早晨7:35改到了8:55。在該學年中，因16至18歲司機造成的車禍數量從前一年的23起降至7起。學生們的學習成績也有所提高，不過並非所有學生都是如此。
After high schools in the South Washington County district, outside Minneapolis, switched to an 8:35 a.m. start, grades in some first- and third-period classes rose between half a point and a full grade point. And the study found that composite scores on national tests such as the ACT rose significantly in two of the five districts.
在整個南華盛頓郡學區（明尼阿波利斯市除外）的高中將上課時間改至8:35後，學生們在上午第一節到第三節課學習的某些課程成績進步了半個到一個績點。研究還發現，在五個學區中，有兩個學區的學生在美國大學入學考試(ACT)等全國性考試中綜合得分顯著提高。
Many researchers say that quality sleep directly affects learning because people store new facts during deep-sleep cycles. During the rapid-eye-movement phases, the brain is wildly active, sorting and categorizing the day’s data. The more sleep a teenager gets, the better the information is absorbed.
許多研究人員認爲，睡眠質量可以直接影響到學習好壞，是因爲人體需要在深睡階段儲存新的知識。在快速眼動睡眠期，大腦高度活躍，對白天的數據資料進行整理和分類。青少年的睡眠時間越充足，他們吸收信息的效果就越好。
“Without enough sleep,” said Jessica Payne, a sleep researcher and assistant professor of psychology at the University of Notre Dame, “teenagers are losing the ability not only to solidify information but to transform and restructure it, extracting inferences and insights into problems.”
聖母大學(University of Notre Dame)的心理學助理教授，睡眠研究員傑茜卡·佩恩(Jessica Payne)表示：“睡眠不足令青少年喪失的不僅僅是鞏固信息的能力，還有將信息轉化和重組，引申出推論並深入洞察問題本質的能力。”
Last February, the school board in Columbia met to consider later start times. “It is really reassuring to know that students can have a say in the matter,” Jilly told them. “So thank you, guys, for that.”
去年2月，哥倫比亞學區的學校董事會召開會議，考慮推遲上課時間。“獲知學生在這個問題上擁有發言權，實在令人欣慰，”吉莉告訴他們。“因此，我感謝你們。”
The moment of decision arrived at the board’s next meeting in March. Jilly sat in the front row, posting on Twitter, and addressed the board one last time. “I know it’s not the most conventional thing and it’s going to get some pushback,” she said, referring to the later time. “But it is the right decision.”
決定性的時刻在3月份董事會的下一次會議時到來。吉莉坐在前排，在Twitter上張貼消息，並最後一次向董事會陳辭。“我知道，（推遲上課時間）不怎麼符合傳統，而且必將會受到一定程度的牴觸。但這是一個正確的決定。”
The board voted, 6 to 1, to push back the high school start time to 9 a.m. “Jilly kicked it over the edge for us,” said Chris Belcher, the superintendent.
經過董事會表決，以6比1的絕對優勢決定將高中上課時間推遲至早晨9點。“吉莉在其中發揮了關鍵的推動作用，”學監克里斯·貝爾徹(Chris Belcher)說。
It is now seven months into the new normal. At Rock Bridge High School, the later end to the day, at 4:05 p.m., is problematic for some, including athletes who often miss the last period to make their away games.
現在已經是執行新作息時間的第七個月。石橋高中的放學時間延遲到了下午4:05，這給一部分同學造成了麻煩，比如運動員要參加客場比賽往往就沒法上最後一節課。
“After doing homework, it gets to be 11:30 p.m. pretty quickly,” said Brayden Parker, a senior varsity football player. “I would prefer to get home by dark and have more time to chill out.”
“等做完家庭作業，很快就到晚上11:30了，”橄欖球隊的畢業班球員佈雷·登帕克(Brayden Parker)說。“我寧願在天黑前回家，想要有更多的時間放鬆一下。”
The high schools in the district have tried to adjust, for example by adding Wi-Fi access to buses so athletes can do homework on the road. Some classes meet only one or two days a week, and are supplemented with online instruction. More sports practices and clubs convene before school.
該學區的高中也在嘗試進行一些調整，以適應新作息時間表，例如，在大巴上增加Wi-Fi服務，以便運動員們在途中做作業。有些課程每週只授課一兩天，再輔以在線輔導。同時，也有更多體育活動和俱樂部選擇在早晨上課前集會。
Some parents and first-period teachers are seeing a payoff in students who are more rested and alert.
一部分家長和頭一堂課的老師已經看到了回報：學生休息得更好，精神也更足。
At 7:45 a.m. on a recent school day, Rock Bridge High, a long, one-story building with skylights and wide hallways, was sun-drenched and almost silent.
最近的一個教學日，早晨7:45，石橋高中有着天窗和寬闊走廊的長條形單層建築中陽光普照，寂靜無聲。
Then, like an orchestra tuning up, students gradually started arriving, some for debate club and choir, others to meet in the cafeteria for breakfast and gossip. Laughter crackled across the lobby, as buses dropped off more students, and others drifted in from the parking lots. The growing crowds could almost be described as civilized.
然後，就像管絃樂隊開始調音一樣，學生們陸續到達，有人討論着俱樂部或者合唱團的事宜，其他人則在餐廳碰面，一邊吃早餐一邊聊八卦。隨着公交車到站，更多的學生走了下來，笑聲響徹大廳，還有學生從停車場中過來加入其中。人羣越聚越多，幾乎可以說世某種特殊的文化。
At 8:53 a.m., Jilly burst through the north entrance door, long hair uncombed and flyaway, wearing no makeup, lugging her backpack.
早晨8:53，吉莉拽着她的揹包從北門入口處衝進來，長長的頭髮亂蓬蓬的，也沒有化妝。
“Even when I am late to school now,” she said, dashing down a corridor to make that 8:55 bell, “it’s only by three or four minutes.”
“現在即使我上學遲到了，”她沿着走廊飛奔，想要趕上8:55的預備鈴，“最多也只是三四分鐘的事兒。”
