WAKE UP! meetings

Room 105 -- Red Brick Courthouse in Rockville (corner of Maryland Ave and E. Jefferson St. --

directly across from the Rockville Library; diagonally across from the County Council Office Building.) Attending: Marie Cohen, Liz Brennan, Robin Barr, John Cornell, Ellen Cosgrove, Andrea Karp and two students from Churchill H.S. doing a school project on the start time issue. Schools represented: Parents were present from the BCC, Walter Johnson, Wooten, and Einstein clusters.

1. We discussed alternative models for high school start times with the idea of presenting them (or a subset of them) when talking to school board members, principals or other groups in the county. We classified them as flexible schedules; shuffling start times; and compressing schedules. We discussed several advantages and drawbacks of the different approaches. Those present agreed that flexible schedule models need to be part of our presentation. All agreed also that a compressed schedule in the current budget climate is unworkable because of the increased costs of bus transportation involved. Opinions were more divided on the idea of moving high school start times later by moving either middle or elementary schools start times earlier. (The option was discussed presuming that all start times would also be shifted about 20 minutes later - with the earliest school start time becoming 7:45 am.) Concerns were raised that neither elementary nor middle school parents are seeking to change start times and such a change would likely generate opposition from these sources. On the other hand, to some, the model appears to be the only viable systemwide solution in a tight budget climate.

2. We discussed whether we should actively seek to present our case to the school board formally. Though there was consensus that such a presentation should be a target in this academic year, those present agreed that substantial preparatory work remains to be done prior to such a presentation. A consensus quickly emerged that it would be wise to go to the board with several principals already agreeing that their schools be potential sites for pilot studies should the board vote to encourage that. As a first step our plan is to survey MCPS high school principals to find out how much of a problem they consider the start time to be in their school. Ellen Cosgrove has agreed to redraft the school board survey to make it suitable for the principals and will send it around core group members for comment. Then using the WAKE UP! list serve we will seek a volunteer member from as many high schools as we have represented in our membership to give the survey to their high school principal.

3. I (RB) asked everyone to be on the lookout for other volunteer groups working in the school system with whom we may share aims. For example, Ed Shirley of the Principals union is concerned about safety issues generated by students traveling to school in darkness.

4. Marie Cohen reported on an MCPS task force engaged in long-range planning. They are shortly to issue a report on a vision of the 21st century high school. Marie indicated that the timing of the committee report is such that there is little opportunity for WAKE UP! input. She is working with members of the appropriate subcommittee to raise our issue though they are close to completing their report.

5. RB explained to those present for the first time that WAKE UP! operates on no standing budget and needs to raise funds directly for any activities that require expenses.

7:30-9:30 pm Red Brick Courthouse in Rockville -- Room G6. corner of Maryland Ave and E. Jefferson St. (directly across from the Rockville Library; diagonally across from the County Council Office Building.)

1. November election : School Board candidates
- select a sub-committee to collect data and interview school board candidates concerning their position on Bell Times and related issues.
- Charge the sub-committee with reporting to the core group on candidate positions
- Approve the core group to make final recommendations to WAKE UP on school board candidates.

2. Report on WAKE UP activities over the summer
- Meeting with, and subsequent action of, school board president, Reginald Felton (Marie Cohen)
- Meeting with MCPS Teacher's Union representative, Mark Simon (Liz Brennan)
- Meeting with principals' organization representative, (Ed Shirley) and Einstein principal (Janice Mills) (Robin Barr)
- Meeting with BCC principal, Katy Harvey over fall-out from 2/8 schedule proposed pilot (Chester Hartman or Kirk Renaud)

3. Discussion of in-school, and in cluster organizing activities
- Sub-committee forming at BCC (Chester Hartman or Kirk Renaud)
- Activities in Walter Johnson cluster (Liz Brennan)
- Activities in Einstein cluster (Ellen Cosgrove)
- Other school organizing activities (members)

4. Discussion of whether WAKE UP should endorse a particular position on changing Bell Times. (members)

5. New business

REPORT OF THE JANUARY 6, 2002 MEETING In attendance were Chester Hartman (BCC), Robin Barr (Westland), Susan Merewitz (BCC), Kirk Renaud (BCC & Westland), Marie Cohen ( Westland ), Jill Camporale (a new Westland participant), Nancy Eng (Tilden), Deborah Schwartz (Walter Johnson)

Susan volunteered to try to get a blue book listing all ptsa contacts for the county. Marie will follow up with outreach using the listing.

The need for outreach to the medical community was noted. Chester said he will pursue this.
The need to stay in touch with Arlington was also agreed on. Susan will follow up. Also Marie, noting that Pat Britz of the National Sleep Foundation wasaddressing an (Illinois?) State Association of Boards of Education, said she would look what similar organization exists in Maryland.

Kirk and Robin reported on their positive meeting with the Principal and Vice Principal at BCC. The result was an understanding that next schoolyear a pilot Flex Schedule program for approximately 100 students might be possible. Mr. Meagher indicated that he would go through the list of classes and identify appropriate candidates: classes that are offered more than once a day and not part of core classes with 2 linked subjects. PE was noted as good for offering a mix of students. Kirk reported that Katy Harvey suggested WJ and Gaithersburg as other potential Flex pilot schools because of likely supportive administrations, and because GB's construction
plans are delayed, so they might need the Flex plan to reduce class size.

Kirk reported on survey results from Elisa's analysis to date. We had a respectable 25 % response rate. Among the interesting results were: that only 44% of this group rides a school bus. About 65% said they were aware of adolescent sleep needs. 68% thought later start times would help students in their school work and academic performance. 35% thought a later schedule would make their student or family schedules more difficult. Elisa and Kirk will write up the results for a PTSA article and our website. They need help from someone who is good with computer graphics software.

Marie and Susan completed an article on "What other schools are doing." Robin and Kirk are finishing up an article on the Flex Schedule for the next newsletter. These articles are to be short because of space limitations but opportunity to keep the subject in public eye is key. Pat will be asked to report on which papers download or request copies of articles. We need someone to do outreach to student newspapers. Susan will contact SHUTI for help on that.

List of core work group members who wish to be consulted on draft documents and ongoing activities between meetings was reconfirmed.

The next meeting was scheduled for December 8th -- a Saturday afternoon to see if more people might attend then.

Present as a guest, hopefully a permanent one, was Lynne Lamberg, a medical writer from Baltimore, who has written extensively -- books, articles -- on sleep issues. FYI, her email is Llamberg@nasw.org; phone 410/486-0297; website sleephomepages.org/books/ . Her new book (co-authored with Michael Smolensky) is The Body Clock Guide to Better Health (Holt), and you'll find many relevant articles on her website.

Terri Lukas reported on the sleep curriculum/message project undertaken at Westland by Amy Wolfson of Holy Cross (Clark?); unfortunately, there was an administrative mixup in returning the survey forms that will make analysis more difficult. Terri will report back shortly on the results.

Robin Barr updated us on the Thornton Commission (bus costs for special ed. students): at this time, no real progress on receiving additional funding so that more bus money will be available for other parts of the system. The big push will come next year.

Chester Hartman will follow up on report that Eleanor Roosevelt HS (VA) has a later starting time plus a championship track team; inf. on models from elsewhere (e.g., Arlington, Wash. Cty.) can be very helpful to us.

Susan Merewitz is pressing Comm. Sup. Frank Stetson and his transportation aide Alan Heard for a followup meeting. We will stress potential of public transp. and walking/biking for Stetson's 4-cluster area, as well as new bus scheduling options.

The BCC parent/student survey has now gone out to all families. Sandee is picking them up regularly at school (43 returns are already in hand). Elisa Braver and Kirk Renaud will put together an instruction sheet on coding. We will arrange for a data input session at Chevy Chase Elem. School later in the month [the 20th from about 4-7 has been tentatively set -- more specifics to come]; parents and students (the latter can get comm. service credit) will be asked to volunteer. Einstein surveys will be included as well. Elisa likely will undertake the basic data analysis, and Chester has volunteered to draft the report (which we will circulate internally for comments prior to release). We need to prepare a dissemination/p.r. plan once we have the results -- to media, MCPS, Board of Ed., County Council, other schools, etc. -- which can be a major boost to our efforts.

Kirk submitted his treasurer's report, listing various people's out-of-pocket costs to date and contributions. We're some $375 short. Contributions still welcome/needed (make it out to him, marking WAKEUP in the memo line -- we have no bank account yet and we're not yet a legal entity -- and send it him, 3906 Woodbine St., Chevy Chase 20815). If anyone wants to see a copy of the report, to check if their own outlays are correctly recorded or otherwise just know more about our (meager) financial status, phone Chester (202/387-9887) and leave a fax # or mailing address.

There was discussion of how we might raise funds for future work (although there is no clear set of estimated needs at this point). Among the suggestions were sponsoring a lecture series; approaching foundations; PTSAs; Natl. Sleep Fdn. Lynne Lamberg expressed an interest in purchasing our domain name from us (to be explored).

Edina/Mpls. research results are due later this month from Kyla Walhstrom. If, as is likely, they are supportive of our work, we should make sure they get widely disseminated (per our BCC survey results).

Starting time options: It was agreed that we should as soon as possible identify 2 or 3 that we find most acceptable, so we can push for them and respond to those who ask what it is specifically we are working toward. Robin, Terri and Kent Wood will try to put this together. We then can, as an initial step, put them out on our listserv/website to see which option is most popular.

Outreach: We need to move ahead aggressively to work with the Stetson cluster of 4 HSs, 5 feeder MSs. It was proposed that we contact the PTSAs at those 9 schools and arrange to meet either with the chair(s) and/or present at a PTSA meeting or a forum, and that we begin making these contacts right away, so we can have these meetings starting as soon as the school year begins (or earlier, if we are just meeting with chairs). We will ask Marie Cohen if she will take charge of setting up these meetings. But to do them properly we must put together an effective, standard presentation (and identify what essentially is an outreach group/speakers bureau to make these presentations). Our next meeting will focus on creating that presentation (although there should be prep. work in advance; and if Stetson arranges a meeting with his other Community Superintendents-- who, unlike Stetson, are not familiar with the issue -- we'll need to do this quite soon).

OUR NEXT MEETING WILL BE SATURDAY [NOT SUNDAY], JULY 14, 3-5 AT LELAND CENTER.

1. Outreach:
        + Einstein HS Hispanic parents group met and there is considerable concern
among them about early starting times.
        + The Einstein PTSA sent out a questionnaire, similar to the one BCC is sending out, to all families, returns just starting to come in.
        + Takoma Park school has also sent out information.
        + All PTSA heads (HS and middle school) have had information and the results of the short BCC survey mailed out to them. Many responses (Blair, Walter Johnson, Chevy Chase Elem., Sligo Creek Elem, etc.)

2. Health Curriculum: Amy Wolfson, on the Holy Cross College faculty, came
to Westland MS, to test both how a message on sleep needs affects awareness
of the issue, as well as a curriculum on sleep issues. Terri Lukas, who
arranged the visit, will obtain and disseminate results shortly.

3. BCC family survey: Materials (detailed survey, in Spanish and English,
to be filled out separately by students and parents) almost ready to be
mailed to all BCC families. We will explore students getting community
service credit for assisting in data input/tabulation/analyis (for Einstein
survey results as well).

4. A meeting has been arranged with MCPS Community Superintendent Frank
Stetson, whose "beat" is four HS clusters: BCC, Walter Johnson (where he
formerly was principal) and 2 others (sorry, didn't get that down -- but I
think it's Wheaton and Whitman) for May 11. Susan Merewitz is putting
together the delegation, which will confer beforehand. Stetson is reputed
to be knowledgeable about and somewhat sympathetic with the start
time/sleep issue. We will ask him to convene a meeting with his other MCPS
Comm. Superintendent colleagues.

Robin Mattles reported on additional conversations he's had with John
Matthews of MCPS. Possibility of exploring selected use of Metrobus and
Ride-On to relieve school bus system, esp. in afternoon, when there is no
conflict with rush hour and overload of system. Also greater use of
bicyles/bike paths. Issue of students arriving at school half-hour early
under current system needs to be emphasized. MCPS longer-range plans for
consortiums would place great additional stress on school bus system.

Re Thornton Commn. (which recommended to MD legislature to double state
subsidy for Special Ed funding): Legislature rejected their recommendation,
keeping state subsidy for Special Ed. Transportation at a wholly inadequate
level. Issue is whether the heavy cost of Special Ed. Transportation is a
key factor in ability/willingness to change bell times.

MCPS Director of Transportation Stephen Raucher doubts this, states (in an email to Robin): "The simplest solution to later HS bell times is to reverse elementary and
HS time. Other jurisdictions already do this (Washington County) [I will make contact with them-CH] If MCPS were to do a similar change, costs and transportation issues would be minimal. The issue becomes one of 'selling' elementary school parents on the change."

Rather than simply switching current elementary and high school times, the group thinks one good possibility is moving forward starting times for allschools. This would mean starting elementary school at 8:10, middle schoolat 8:40, and high school at 9:35 a.m.

Elementary school parents would not be happy about their kids starting school at 7:25 a.m. but they may be willing to support starting schools at 8:10 a.m. (working parents no longer would have to arrange for before-school care and many parents could wait at the bus stops with their children before going to work).

Another advantage is that John Mathews of MCPS Transportation actually was receptive to this suggestion, because it did not involve hiring many more buses and drivers. A few more drivers might be needed because we would not want high schools starting any later than 9:35 a.m. (elementary schools currently have staggered starting times).

A range of options have recently been discussed in the WAKEUP listserv, and many are listed in a chart contained in a MCPS report (which chart will be placed on our website). The ones listed there were evaluated with no change in basic assumptions about other changes in the system. We will do our own revised list of the pros and cons of various possible time changes, so that people can offer their views, and we then can possibly arrive at a consensus as to which we wish to advocate. [Noting Dr. Raucher's comment/suggestion above, an obvious argument to sell such a switch is that elem. school students will before long be HS students - CH]

At our previous meeting, Nancy Eng volunteered to get information on the starting times of various DC area (mainly private) schools. Here's that information:

Georgetown Prep: 8:15
Holton Arms:       8:10
DC Public HS       8:45
Holy Cross          8:10
Field                   8:20
Sidwell                8:00
St. Andrews         8:25
Sandy Spring       8:00
Bullis                  8:00

NEXT MEETING: SUNDAY, JUNE 3, 3-5pm
RE LOCATION: We are open to suggestions of different locations that might
produce larger turnouts from more schools. If you have suggestions (esp. if
you are someone who would come if the meeting were in a more central Mont.
Cty. location), please let us know and if possible suggest a place.
We're also not wed to Sunday afternoons -- no time is ideal for everyone,
but if you have other suggestions, pls. let us know.

In attendance were parents and students from BCC HS, Westland MS, Takoma Park MS, Blair HS, Whitman HS.

Brief discussion of whether the foul-up in reopening BCC might help or hinder our efforts. Hard to predict, but consensus that any special effort to pressure MCPS into dealing specially with BCC as a concession to the delay ought to be handled on a separate track from the broader effort to create later starting times.

1) E-mail communication within WAKE UP!:
Pat Esslinger, the WAKE UP! listserve administrator, explained the reason for the recent rash of membership cancellations, i.e., many current members are mistakenly sending e-mail responses to the entire membership. As a result, the WAKE UP! e-mail network has been generating an excessive amount of e-mail within itself, which in turn caused a number of the newest members to unsubscribe rather than try to sort through all their incoming e-mails. The number of members who cancelled their membership for this reason was small, but the problem is nonetheless can be a threat to effective communication within WAKE UP!
Thus, Pat stressed the importance of limiting the scope of e-mail distribution whenever communicating within the group. Distribution of e-mails to the entire WAKE UP! group should be rare, and only done when there is a real need for communication within the entire membership. When in doubt, members are encouraged to seek advice from Pat <Pat@PatEsslinger.com>

2) Organization of WAKE UP!
Chester Hartman suggested the formation of a number of working groups to
which each member should volunteer, if at all possible.
Coordinators for some of the groups have already come forth; other groups are
still in need of them. Members are encouraged to join one or more of the
working groups; to volunteer to be a coordinator where none exists; and to suggest other working groups which they would like to have formed and which they would be willing to organize and/or participate in.

Transportation - Coordinator: Robin Barr <robmattles@aol.com> (who reported
on a reasonably positive meeting with a high MCPS transportation official
and plans to have followup meetings). Kent Wood working on this as well.

Political Relations: Dealing with County Council, Board of Ed,
Senate/Congressional representatives, Thornton (Special Education Funding)
Commission - Interim Coordinator: Terri Lukas <TALukas@aol.com>

MCPS Administration - Interim Coordinator: Susan Merewitz <yelrwagn@yahoo.com>

Surveys: Coordinator - Kirk Renaud <kirkrenaud@aol.com>, Elisa Braver <Ebraver@iihs.org> (Einstein H.S. survey, see below)

Sports Issues/Coaches: Coordinator - San-Dee Ostrach <lousanostrach@mindspring.com>

Outreach/Communication/Information (outreach to more schools, relations
with press, radio, TV ): Interim Coordinator - Sue Pardo <SusanPardo@aol.com>

Website Development Coordinators - Pat Esslinger <Pat@patesslinger.com> who will get help from Zach Allen <Labsolute7@aol.com> of the student-managed organization SHUTI.

A "troika" Steering Committee (Terri Lukas, Susan Merewitz, Chester
Hartman) was agreed to, on a provisional basis, with the intention of
substituting some non-BCC parent(s) as the group expands its participation
and work.

3) Surveys Recently completed and "In-Progess":
A three-question survey was done at BCC during first period on March 16,
with the permission of principal Katy Harvey. Students were asked what time
they fell asleep the night before; what time they go up that morning; and
what grade they were in. Responses were turned in from about half the
student body.
The results were stark and disturbing: BCC students are averaging about 6
1/2 hours sleep per night. (There is no reason to assume the report is
atypical.) Sleep researchers believe teenagers need 9- 9 1/2 hours sleep.
Thus, on average, B-CC students are accumulating a 15 hour "sleep
deficit" per school week. There was only minor variation by grade level. (A
more complete report on the results of the survey is being prepared for
distribution.) Efforts will be made to organize students to work on the
sleep issue, as they are most directly impacted.
Other schools are encouraged to conduct the same short survey -- the time and
effort to do so are minimal. The results, if collected from different high
schools in different parts of the County, will be very useful in discussions
with County and State decision-makers on the issue of school starting
times. (Contact - Susan Merewitz <yelrwagn@yahoo.com>)
Two other survey efforts are in play:
1) A survey of Einstein HSstudents’ sleep habits, distributed through their high school newsletter. (Contact Elisa Braver <Ebraver@iihs.org> to volunteer your assistance in data entry/analysis).
2) A considerably more detailed survey of B-CC HS families (separate but overlapping questionnaires for parents and students). (Contact - Kirk Renaud <KirkRenaud@aol.com>) This survey will be mailed to B-CC families shortly, under the auspices of the PTSA.

There was continued discussion of the merits of proposing a later bell time pilot program at B-CC vs. working for later bell times County-wide (either as a pilot, or a permanent change). No conclusions were reached.

There was also discussion of outreach to other high school clusters in the county. Marie Cohen recently called every high school PTA in the county and asked that WAKE UP! be publicized in their schools. As a result, a steady trickle of parents from several high schools and middle schools have been joining WAKEUPnet. In connection with publicizing the results of the recently-completed short survey done at BCC, we hope to recruit somebody in each high school and middle school who can serve as a conduit for circulating such information in their school.

The next WAKE UP! meeting is scheduled for Sunday, May 6, 3-5pm, at the Leland Center, 4301 Willow Lane, Bethesda. (Future meetings may be held at alternative sites more convenient for the membership, particularly as the group's membership expands to incorporate other high schools and middle schools.)