My Civil Advocate

According to the National Sleep Foundation, teenagers on average need 8-10 hours of sleep each night in order to fire on all cylinders the next day. Trouble is, 87 percent of them fall short. Many of them also experience what the medical community calls "phase delay"; they have more trouble falling asleep earlier in the night than in their pre-high school days, possibly due to hormonal changes, which means they want to sleep longer in the morning. There's one big problem: Many schools start classes at roughly 7:30 a.m. If you give a kid one hour to get ready, that's a 6:30 a.m. wake up. GO back 8-10 hours and you arrive at a bedtime of 8:30-10:30. For many teens, that ain't happenin'.  Some school districts have opted to move starting times one hour later. The results have been encouraging: lower rates of absenteeism and tardiness, improved academic performance, increased levels of safety (e.g., driving to school), and a diminished incidence of health issu...

Despite knowing the dangers of their actions, nearly nine out of ten teenage drivers continue to engage in distracted driving behaviors such as texting or talking on a cell phone according to recent surveys. The study, conducted by Seventeen magazine and AAA, asked nearly 2,000 teens, ages 16-19, about their driving habits. While 84 percent of the respondents indicated that they were aware that distracted driving could increase their risk of having an accident and being injured, 86% still engaged in behaviors such as: Texting; Eating; Applying Makeup; Adjusting the radio, or CD player; Driving with four or more passengers in the vehicle. This survey reveals just how many distractions there are today for teenage drivers and how hard it can be to combat against them. Distracted driving leads to nearly 6,000 deaths each year, according the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. To find out more about distracted driving, visit  Distraction.gov. Visit us ...