[ijpoijpoihpiuoh]

I wonder how the policy discussions looked when considering the impact on poor parents who have to be at work. Maybe the thinking was that the start time of 7:30-8AM was already too late to save these folks, so 8:30AM would not make them much worse off? Or maybe there are fewer people in these circumstances than I fear?

[secabeen]

This law is only for grades 7-12, so most affected kids can get themselves to school, or don't need direct supervision between when parents leave for work and when the bus arrives.

[topkai22]

I'd also point out I've never lived in a school district that started elementary school before 8a, so these parents must have had solutions for those years. The real problem is going to be if elementary schools get pushed forward to start at 7a and release at 1p or something crazy like that, but I know most districts don't want the liability of 8 year olds waiting for the bus in the dark along side a major road.

[kenperkins]

My 7 and 9yo kids start school at 8:50am, and don't get off the bus until 4:30pm. It's ridiculous. They're young and need time off but because the district moved everyone back to make room for the High Schools now elementary kids aren't home until half past 4.

Not enough time for them to play in the afternoons now.

[vonmoltke]

Either their elementary school is in session for an awful long time (mine was 6 hours), or they have a really long bus ride home.

[Broken_Hippo]

Poor kids and parents are almost always penalised: Remove one and another comes up. These same folks are simply being penalised at a different time of day - morning instead of afternoon. This is solved in a number of ways - the most basic being providing before-school programs for the (especially!) the younger children. This can include things like breakfast too.

[dlivingston]

There will always be people for whom a school start time of X is inconvenient, will there not be? And, while middle- and upper-class people might be more likely to have the standard 9-to-5, there are still plenty that don't (nurses & doctors, for example).

[crooked-v]

"Every parent in California" is pretty big negotiating block when it comes to setting standard work hours.