Hilton Head Middle’s early start time irks parents

A new later start time for most middle and high schools in the 2016-17 school year has been hailed as a smart move by many Beaufort County parents, but it is angering some at Hilton Head Island Middle School, where the first bell will ring 40 minutes before any other next year.

The Beaufort County school board voted Tuesday to change start times to give middle and high school students more time to sleep. The Hilton Head Island school cluster schedules, however, will remain the same.

Middle and high schools in the rest of the district will start about an hour later at 9 a.m. and elementary schools will start about 30 minutes earlier at 8 a.m., the board voted. This leaves Hilton Head Island Middle School as the sole school to keep its 7:20 a.m. start time.

One mother called the Beaufort County School District office Thursday morning after dropping off her sixth-grader just to illustrate her point that a 7:20 a.m. start time is too early.

As expected, the office did not answer. It doesn’t open until 8 a.m.

“I wonder why it’s acceptable for my 12 year old to have to be in class, and they feel it’s sufficient for the school officials to not have to be,” the caller, Amanda Gilliam, said she told the district in her voicemail. “To get him up at 6:15 in the morning is... it’s just unnacceptable.”

Generally, district officials agree. Before changing next year’s start times for the rest of the district, superintendent Jeff Moss and school board members both cited research that states sleep-deprived adolescents are more likely to experience mental and physical illness, poor academic performance and driving accidents.

But Hilton Head schools, which first piloted a version of the later start times in 2014, are sticking with their adjusted schedule. Next fall, high school students will continue arriving about 8:30 a.m., middle schoolers about 7:20 a.m., and elementary schoolers about 8:20 a.m.

In an email Thursday, Moss said the cluster is staying the same to allow Hilton Head High students time to travel from the island to the new May River High School in Bluffton, opening in fall 2016, and to Beaufort-Jasper Academy for Career Excellence for Career and Technical Education courses.

However, he added, “I am still reviewing the current method to determine if there may be a creative way, which will allow all schools to follow the same schedule.”

Moss did not state during Tuesday’s meeting that he was looking into changing Hilton Head schools’ bell schedules, which would require another board vote.

On Thursday, Moss said he has told the school board that administrators on Hilton Head want their schools to start at the same times as the rest of the district.

Hilton Head Island High School Principal Amanda O’Nan said she’s not aware of any push from the administrators in her cluster to change their schedules, and that doing so could create bus and traffic concerns.

Hilton Head Middle Principal Neodria Brown said she knew parents would support a later start time, and acknowledged that Moss is looking into it. However, when asked if a later start time was realistic for the school, Brown said she did not know, as the conversation was in the early stages.

“We’re in a cluster of four schools, so there is some traffic congestion,” Brown said. “So all that comes into play when you’re looking at star times.”

In the meantime, Hilton Head Middle parents said they are frustrated their students don’t seem to be getting equal treatment.

“If you’re such a believer in it, you’re doing a whole paradigm shift for start times and you’re doing it for everywhere but one school, I want to know why you’re not doing it for that one school,” said Kim Boyce, a mother of a Hilton Head Middle sixth-grader.

Flipping the schedules for the rest of the schools will not cost any additional money next year, Moss said. Changing the bell schedules on the island two years ago cost the district an additional nine buses and drivers, which Moss said at the time could cost up to $400,000.

Parents’ concerns, though, are the costs to their children.

“It’s killer. We drop them off in the pitch-black dark. What sense does that make?” said Boyce, adding that she’s reached out to administrators before but was told bus schedules prevented later start times. “...You would think you’re asking them to move Mount Rushmore.”

Melissa Monge, who also has a sixth-grade son at Hilton Head, said she hoped her family would adapt to the schedule after a few weeks or months.

Instead, she said, “It’s even more of a struggle each morning getting them up and out the door.”

Reached Thursday, Hilton Head school board members JoAnn Orischak and Bill Payne said they both supported a later start time for Hilton Head Middle, but weren’t sure where the district’s plans stood.

When asked whether he was concerned about the well-being of those middle schoolers, scheduled to have a 7:20 a.m. bell next year, Moss said only, “I am concerned about the well being of all 22,000 students.”

This story was originally published March 17, 2016 at 4:35 PM with the headline "Hilton Head Middle’s early start time irks parents."