The Science Behind Sleep: Why Everyone Should be a Night Owl by Kashish

The Science Behind Sleep: Why Everyone Should be a Night Owl by Kashish - January 2019 Scholarship Essay

Beep! Beep! Beep! I turn to my side as I groggily reach for my phone to hit the snooze on the incessant and unrelenting alarm. My eyes flutter open, and I reluctantly prepare myself to leave the comfort and warmth of my bed.
I often wonder why we start our days so early. Studies show that students, especially high school students like myself, do not receive the necessary amount of sleep per night due to substantial amounts of homework, after school extra-curricular activities, and part-time jobs.
Not only is it difficult for students to sleep before 11 p.m due to the large amounts of work we have after school, but the very nature of our body makes it highly difficult for us to sleep early in the night. When children reach puberty, their circadian rhythms, also known as their internal body clocks, shift forward by approximately two hours, which causes teenagers to be highly alert until 11 p.m, if not later. Our body’s own biological clock makes sleeping before 11 p.m seem unnatural, ensuring a lack of sleep in the common teenager.
A lot of my friends argue that in order to find time to complete all homework assignments and preparation for exams, we should simply sleep early and then wake up an hour early every morning to cram in a study session. However, studies show that it takes approximately one full hour before our brain is functioning at a moderately high level. Since brain function is below average when waking up, it is scientifically a time of less productivity. I can attest to this with some of my own experiences at school. Comparing my performance in two equally difficult classes, one at the start of my day and one at the very end, my academic performance is significantly higher in my last class of the day. Both my brain and my body have had time to become fully functional and reach optimal levels, and therefore, perform at higher levels. Many schools have started to adopt later start times, as a motion to not only allow students to have more rest time, but because of the productivity issues in the early hours of the morning.
Personally, I feel as if it takes longer for me than the average person to feel fully awake and aware in the morning, but my stamina is continuous, and once I am awake, I can stay up as long as necessary with little fatigue.
So yes, I would most definitely consider myself a night owl. I would much rather stay up a little later at night, and allow myself those blissful extra few minutes in my very comfortable and cozy bed every morning.