A state-level regulation being proposed by the Nevada State Board of Education (NSBE) to mandate that middle and high school start times be no earlier than 8:30 a.m. could further complicate the considerations of the Humboldt County School District (HCSD) Board of Trustees to possibly switch all of the schools in Humboldt County to a four-day schedule.
Since the beginning of 2023, the HCSD has been considering extending four-day school weeks to schools in Winnemucca, as some of the District’s remote rural schools already operate on a four-day schedule. Many concerns have been raised and the Trustees have agreed that the consideration will have to involve input, such as extensive surveying, from the public.
Coupled with the talk of later start times, which currently range form 7:55 a.m. to 8:25 a.m. in the HCSD, the Trustees will now have to evaluate how that may further impact scheduling, busing, sports and other extracurriculars, as well as the community.
The District is already struggling to maintain adequate staffing to run bus routes and the regulation would mean that the HCSD has to create additional routes, imposing significant transportation cost increases, and pushing back school end times to around 5 p.m. for some schools, according to Jensen.
The NSBE has cited research from experts who found that early start times are disruptive to the natural sleep rhythms of teens and can impact mental and physical health, as well as academic success, but for most Nevada counties, the cons far outweigh the pros, Jensen explained.
According to a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from Oct. 2022, the “American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended that middle and high schools start at 8:30 a.m. or later to give students the opportunity to get the amount of sleep they need, but most American adolescents start school too early,” which can lead to sleep disorders and other issues for students.
“I can’t argue the research that talks about the benefit of later start times for high school kids, but the application of that is significantly problematic,” said Jensen. “Speaking for not only Humboldt County but the other rural school districts, we understand that there’s some benefit, but the benefit is outweighed by the negatives and those negatives really revolve around the ability for us to even meet those targets such as a later start, because of the impacts on staffing, and cost, and then the unintended consequences around extracurricular activities.”
Jensen said that the regulation is fundamentally centered on Clark County and the NSBE is discussing exemptions for rural schools already. Another major concern among school districts is the authority for the NSBE to impose a regulation such as this.
“One of the big challenges we’re facing right now is the question: does the State Board of Education have statutory or legal authority over local governance or local school boards? For most of us [superintendents], we say they don’t. They are advisory, and that’s their role—to provide advice to the Nevada Department of Ed and the governor’s office in the legislature,” he explained.
The NSBE is comprised of elected and appointed individuals as well as at least one Nevada superintendent with the Nevada Department of Education acting as an advisory board, but not many of the members are educators working directly in schools.
“We stand as a collective group of superintendents in the state in opposition to this. And we’re saying if those conversations have merit, they need to occur at the local level to allow the school boards of individual communities to make those decisions, not have some oversight body directing us to do something. They don’t fully understand the repercussions of that direction,” said Jensen.
The state determines the amount of instructional minutes that all schools must provide to students and Humboldt does intentionally go beyond the requirements that allow the District the ability not to extend the school year in the event of unexpected circumstances, such as snow days or other major weather events, power outages, or other incidents. If the HCSD switches to a four-day school week with later start times, the impact could be huge for students.
“We have some very clear goals, our staff, our administrators, on seeing academic improvement, and we know the biggest impact on that is having direct instructional time…We have to just ask the question, do we want to reduce our instructional time? We haven’t come up with answers yet,” said Jensen.
What's Next
NSBE President Felicia Ortiz said the board will work with the state Department of Education on creating the initial draft language for the regulation, which she expects will be ready by the board’s next meeting July 26. If the board approves that initial language, it will go to the state’s Legislative Counsel Bureau, which will write more formal language and send it back to the board, which will hold a hearing on the proposed regulation before finalizing it.