Nearly 1.6 million elementary school students in Shanghai start their new spring semester today.

 

And this semester, hundreds of primary and secondary schools in downtown Luwan and suburban Jiading districts are piloting a scheme which allows students get to school about 20 minutes later -- a major schedule change to ease the morning rush pressure on students.

 

The pilot schools are also required to replace their original morning study session with sports activities in the hope of improving local children's physical fitness.

 

"We should be committed to the 'health first' principle by giving children more sleeping and sports time,'' Shen Xiaoming, director of the Shanghai Education Commission says today.

 

Elementary school students in Shanghai were generally required to get to school at about 7:20 AM every day, meaning that those who lived at some distance from the school had to get up at 6 AM or even earlier to squeeze onto packed buses together with adult commuters.

 

Students also had to take part in morning study sessions in classrooms, doing some reading or academic exercises, before taking group morning exercises at about 8 AM.

 

The new schedule, however, relaxes the rigors of the previous tough morning rush hour.

 

At Luwan's Xiangming Middle School, for instance, from this semester students will be allowed to get to school at 7:45 AM. Students may go to the playground for open-air games such as basketball or aerobics immediately after dropping off their school bags.

 

"That extra 25 minutes can make a huge difference,'' said Xu Bihong, a 13-year-old sixth grader at Xiangming.

 

Living in the northern part of Shanghai, Xu said she had to spend about one hour getting to school every day. The tight morning schedule left her no time for breakfast at home so she had to grab something to eat on the road.

 

"Now I can sleep in for 15 more minutes and still have enough time to eat breakfast,'' she said.

 

(Shanghai Daily February 26, 2007)