Case Study: San Juan Unified School District gathers 7,000+ community perspectives to inform high school start-time decisions with ThoughtExchange

7,000 Personal Perspectives On School Start Times

San Juan Unified School District in California, a large district serving roughly 49,000 students across more than 65 schools, explored shifting high school start times after parents and community members raised research-backed concerns about student sleep and learning. The district needed a way to gather highly personal, nuanced feedback from across its diverse community—online surveys were too rigid and hosting enough town halls was impractical.

San Juan used Thoughtexchange to run a district-wide conversation that engaged 7,309 participants who contributed 15,711 thoughts and assigned 288,819 stars to ideas that resonated. The platform saved staff weeks of work, preserved verbatim community input in a neutral forum, surfaced key concerns (athletics, logistics, homework, family time), and produced actionable analysis that the Board is using to develop alternative start-time scenarios and re-engage the community with transparent results.

San Juan Unified School District

Trent Allen

Director Of Community Relations