Teenagers all over the world are affected by sleep deprivation. Not getting enough sleep is bad for the human body, as it can cause many problems in your daily life. Teens need around eight to ten hours of sleep per night, and some studies are showing that close to 70% of teenagers don't get that.

Let me start off with a little story: I'm a student athlete. Because I play a high school sport, sometimes on away games we might not get home until around 11:00pm or even midnight depending on where we came from. Let's say that I get home at 10:30pm. I have to take a shower, eat, do homework, and then somehow fall asleep without staying up overthinking. By the time I finally fall asleep it would usually be around 11:45 depending on the amount and the difficulty of the homework I need to get done. If I then wake up at 5:45 to get ready for school, I would only get 6 hours of sleep. When this happens, I usually am not able to fall asleep, and I'm usually super close to falling asleep while silent reading in english class. (Which, if/when I get caught, can be a problem.)

I'm not the only one this happens to. "Nationally, more than 1 in 3 high schoolers (34.6%) participated in high school sports in 2022-23" (Source - Lending Tree.com). This would mean that over one third of high school students in the United States are sleep deprived as you read this. Study's show that "The developing brain of a teenager needs between eight and 10 hours of sleep every night. The effects of chronic (ongoing) sleep deprivation may include: concentration difficulties." This can ultimately cause low performance in school and no one wants to fail. 

If this is implemented in CSD (Cashmere School District) teenagers will be able to have possibly two hours more of sleep. That might not sound like a big difference right now, but many teenagers, including myself, would kill to have more sleep without being tardy to their first period class. If this doesn't get implemented, teens will continue to not have enough sleep, and that will keep causing poor performance in school. 

Now is the time to allow our teenagers to get enough sleep for their growing brains and bodies. Sign this petition to support students in our community and ultimately, around the nation.