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http://www.videonot.es/edit/0BxOf02cl2sCfWDhvbFU5RjVqSHM

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Confessions of a Community College Dean: 8 a.m. Classes

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In which a veteran of cultural studies seminars in the 1990's moves into academic administration and finds himself a married suburban father of two. Foucault, plus lawn care. Comments are welcome. Comments for general readership can be posted directly after the blog entry. For private comments, I can be reached at deandad at gmail dot com.

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By Mikayla Bowen

BEEP BEEP BEEP. Your backup alarm for your second class goes off at 8:30 a.m. Because you knew there was a solid chance that you wouldn't hear or get up to your earlier alarm for your 8 a.m. class. Why? You're a college student, and 8:00 a.m. classes are the struggle.

Lately there has been a debate over the practicality of early morning classes, particularly 8:00 a.m. classes. Most college students shudder at the thought of very early morning classes and only take them if forced to due to personal scheduling conflicts or lack of class availability. So if students typically avoid such early classes, why not give them classes at the times they prefer?

Marisa Hernandez, a first-year student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has 8 a.m. classes every day. She gives her input on early classes: "I am not particularly a fan of 8 a.m. classes. The only reason that I am in 8 a.m.'s everyday this semester is because I literally had the latest sign up time for class registration."

Some students and professors say that there should not be 8 a.m. classes because students often miss these classes and are sleepy even when they do show up so they often do not learn as well. Psychology professors Serge Onyper and Pamela Thacher and a team of researchers from St. Lawrence University performed a study which examined if students who had later class times would experience less daytime sleepiness and perform better academically as a result of increased amount of sleep. They came to the conclusion that college students with later class times, in fact, slept longer, were less sleepy during the day, and were less likely to miss class than those with earlier classes. Also, a clinical review from Giuseppe Curcio and a team of researchers reports that with less sleep, a student's ability to learn and to consolidate memory is impeded. This review states that insufficient sleep is associated with poor procedural and declarative memory.

It may seem that there is enough evidence to ban 8 a.m. classes from the correlation of increased sleep and student functionality. However, this is not necessarily the case. The St. Lawrence University study also shows that students with later classes, on average, did not perform better academically and had a higher rate of alcohol consumption. For this reason, there is the argument that 8 a.m. classes should most definitely not be abolished. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine states that students who drink more alcohol have a decreased quality of sleep, so therefore, getting more sleep with later classes is not necessarily more beneficial ("AASM News Archive").
Also, many argue that students should learn how to get up early in college because in the real world after graduation, they will have to get up early for work. However, in the job world, there is not the same level of homework and time needed for studying for tests that there is in college, so it would typically be easier to go to bed early.

There are also some benefits of 8 a.m. classes, however. For example, Hernandez enjoys ending classes before lunch on most days. Some people even naturally have early circadian rhythms and prefer to take early classes. Though this is definitely not the majority of college students, these preferences shouldn't be overlooked.

There is clearly not one universal solution to the issue of 8 a.m. classes. Those students who have a bad class registration time like Hernandez should not be punished by having to take the earliest classes, even if they will not be consuming alcohol either way. However, these early classes should still be available for the minority of college students who have early circadian rhythms and prefer to have early classes. One example of a possible solution could be having smaller class sizes for 8 a.m. classes to provide incentive for taking these early classes. This decrease in number of seats could be compensated by expanding the number of seats in later classes or creating more sections in the later morning and afternoon. Hernandez says that she is more awake and focused during her smaller 8 a.m. class because these smaller classes tend to be more interactive.

In the coming years, we may see the end of 8 a.m. classes at some universities. Lake Superior State University has pioneered the banning of 8 a.m. classes by banning these classes for the coming 2016-2017 academic year. The primary reason this University chose to ban 8 a.m. classes is to allow students the opportunity to attend University Senate meetings and to hold student organization meetings at a time that doesn't conflict with dinner for most people. The University Provost David Finley states, "We see [banning 8 a.m. classes] as a beneficial side effect. Many college students aren't at their best at that hour."

We may be witnessing a change in early morning class structure in the coming years. But for now, students like Hernandez will have to suffer through and keep going (or not going) to their 8 a.m. classes.

Works Cited

"AASM News Archive." AASM. American Academy of Sleep Medicine, 8 June 2011. Web. 27 Jan. 2016.

Alarm Clock Picture. Digital image. Free Photobank. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.

Curcio, Giuseppe, Michele Ferrara, and Luigi De Gennaro. "Sleep loss, learning capacity and academic performance." Sleep medicine reviews 10.5 (2006): 323-337.

Hernandez, Marisa. "Thoughts on 8:00 Am Classes." Personal interview. 2 Feb. 2016.

Logue, Josh. "No More 8 A.M. Classes." Inside Higher Ed. Inside Higher Ed, 17 Feb. 2016. Web. 22 Feb. 2016.

Onyper, Serge V., Pamela V. Thacher, Jack W. Gilbert, and Samuel G. Gradess. "Class Start Times, Sleep, and Academic Performance in College: A Path Analysis." Chronobiology International Chronobiol Int 29.3 (2012): 318-35. Web. 25 Jan. 2016.

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By Mikayla Bowen BEEP BEEP BEEP. Your backup alarm for your second class goes off at 8:30 a.m. Because you knew there was a solid chance that you wouldn't hear or get up to your earlier alarm for your 8 a.m. class. Why? You're a college student, and 8:00 a.m.

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"While most colleges have start times of around 8 a.m., Jonathan Kelley advises NPR Ed that the ideal start time would be more like 10 or 11 a.m."