FAIRPORT, N.Y. – A major change is coming to Fairport High School. The school board voted unanimously Tuesday night to push the start time from 7:25 a.m. to 9 a.m. in two years. The end time will also move from 2:20 p.m. to 3:45 p.m.

The change starts in September 2026.

“Like, this is going to be tough but it’s the right thing for kids. I know it’s going to be hard but it’s the right thing for kids,” said Janice Fortuna, Fairport Board of Education member.

Dr. Brian Moritz, another board member, added, “The benefits we can give all of our kids are just huge with this.”

A survey of Fairport High School students showed 42 percent, almost half of them, got less than 6 hours of sleep a night. The recommendation is 10 hours. Less sleep equals lower grades, poorer mental health and more absenteeism. At a meeting in June, one expert told the school board “waking a teen at 6 a.m. is biologically like waking an adult at 4 a.m.”

Watch the June Fairport school board meeting that lays out the evidence of the change

News10NBC’s Berkeley Brean met with Fairport Superintendent Brett Provenzano at the high school Wednesday morning.

Berkeley Brean, News10NBC: “But do you want to see better attendance, better test scores, better graduation rate?”

Brett Provenzano, Fairport school superintendent: “We want to see, I think we want to see, as we move through this journey, we want to see improved attendance, we want to see graduation rates continue to rise.”

Roughly 500 school districts in the U.S. have pushed their high school start times back. The laws in California and Florida say high school must start after 8:30 a.m. It’s recommended teenagers get up to 10 hours of sleep a night. That means right now Fairport High schoolers should be in bed and sleeping by 9 p.m.

“And I think any of us who have ever had a teenager knows that’s ridiculous and preposterous,” said John Foxe, director of the Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience at the University of Rochester.

Berkeley Brean: “John, why don’t more schools do this?”

John Foxe: “You know you can imagine the logistics of it. So it takes real bravery, I would say, for a school district to dive into this because it’s disruptive. But when the dust settles, if you take that step, when the dust settles, there will be major advantages to the youngsters.”

Webster pushed the start of its high schools back in 2019. COVID impacted some of the effects, but Webster says a survey of students shows an average increase of 30 minutes of sleep, improved attendance and teachers reporting “an increase in student engagement in first period classes.”

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