The Sunshine Protection Act has been a big topic of conversation over the past month. U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fl) first introduced the act in 2018 but nothing has been put into effect until recently. While the Senate has already passed the act, Congress still has to pass it for daylight savings to be removed. 28% of people living in the U.S. think they should keep daylight savings while 31% of people think differently. 

“Daylight Saving has been unnecessary. But I realize that while I don’t personally benefit from the time change, maybe there are people who do,” said Jim Howard, a dedicated art teacher. 

Howard’s opinion isn’t isolated. While it might seem unnecessary daylight savings was designed to save fuel for artificial lighting during wartime specifically.  Germany and Austria first put in place daylight savings on April 30th, 1916 but George Vernon Hudson and William Willett created the idea all the way back in 1895. Hudson and Willett introduced their idea to the Wellington Philosophical Society. The Society was interested but never took any initiative. In 1905, Willett tried to change the idea himself by instead changing the clocks 2 times to change them 8 times a year. Robert Pearce, a British Member of Parliament, liked his idea and took it to the House of Commons in 1908. Thousands of people, especially farmers, rejected the idea causing Willetts’s idea to never be put in place. Germany taking in daylight savings caused a domino effect of other countries to do the same thing even if people did not want it.

  “ I would rather it stay ahead, so summertime because I enjoy the night being long and it being bright,” said sophomore Bryana Myers. 

In the winter when it gets darker earlier your melatonin naturally can increase causing people to be more tired in winter and more energized in the summer. As soon as the human body senses the absence of light, the brain will send a message to the body that it’s time to rest. The sun has a very big effect on when the levels of melatonin will increase or not because of how much light it creates. Being in any type of light can affect the body because of the lux scale. The lux scale is a measurement of how bright a source of light is. Direct sunlight can be anywhere from 32,000 lux to 100,000 lux, sunrise or sunset can be around 400 lux and Moonlight is only 1 lux. But, until Congress passes the act daylight savings will still be a part of most of the U.S.