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Health & Fitness

Jilly's story is now Northeast Ohio's story

The North Olmsted Board of Education has the opportunity to create a happy ending.

High school sophomore Jilly dos Santos became America’s daughter on January 14 when she stepped up to a podium to face a row of adults with the power to impact all aspects of her life.  With grace and much moxie Jilly started a movement that will undoubtedly improve the education, safety, health and financial future of thousands of her classmates. 

Now Northeast Ohio has a Jilly of its own – and we hope that her story ends just as well. 

On January 9, Jilly, a sophomore at Rock Bridge High School in Columbia, Missouri, found out about a plan to move the school start time from 7:50 am to 7:20 am next fall due to busing changes.  At 10:32 pm that evening she formed a Facebook group called Students’ Say and sent out distress calls via Facebook and Twitter. 

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The SOS calls were picked up by professionals from Maryland to Wisconsin to Ohio.  In a matter of five days these professionals sent Jilly links to a plethora of research on the biochemical reasons teens can’t fall asleep early enough to accommodate early wake times and the effects of chronic sleep deprivation.  Jilly found out that experts around the country recommend that middle and high schools start after 8:30 am – thus it was clear that 7:20 am was very much a move in the wrong direction.  Jilly also found out that hundreds of schools around the nation have acted on the research and adopted later school start times for adolescents with amazing results: decreased auto accidents, improved grades, improved standardized test scores, improved behavior, and increased enrollment just to name a few. 

Armed with the clinical data, Jilly and other members of the community successfully pled with the superintendent and school board to re-think the decision.  But that wasn’t the end of the story - in a wonderful epilogue the Columbia school board voted on March 11 to adopt a high school start time of 9am for the next school year.

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Nine days after Jilly’s happy ending in Missouri, another girl’s story begins in Ohio.  On March 20 a 13-year old student stepped up to a microphone nearly as tall as her and addressed the North Olmsted Board of Education.  With a  surprisingly steady voice she asked these adults to reject a proposal to move the high school start time from 7:45 am to 7:20 am, and the middle school from 7:38 am to 7:23 am.  She was joined by a host of parents who raised concerns that the proposal (to allow for time at the end of the school day for teacher professional development and student intervention) will directly harm North Olmsted students.   The board decided to table the vote until Tuesday March  26.  This girl’s story is still being written – but the North Olmsted Board of Education has the opportunity to make it a happy ending.

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