The US is about thirty times larger than Poland and much of it was developed after the wide adoption of automobiles. Few children live within a mile of their school here, and of the ones that do, there are often not walkable routes to get there. Many roads in the US have no sidewalk and are intended only for vehicle traffic.
I am one of the few parents that trusts their own kids to walk a short distance to school by themselves. I have received a few comments from other parents implying negligence for trusting my kids.
I have doubts that it's busy roads that changed this behaviour.
Is that really true? 80% of Americans live within large metro areas rather than rural areas.
Look for the percentage who actually live in the cities, vs. the metro areas.
And when I lived in the Denver suburbs, my brother attended a couple of county schools. The junior high was at least a couple of miles away, the high school more like five. Do not underestimate American sprawl.
Part of it is the spread-out car culture of the US, where virtually the entire country is so car-centric that walking anywhere is prohibitively difficult and/or risky. It's kinda self-reinforcing - walking is awkward and discouraged, so almost nobody does it, so there's no incentive to fix any of the walkability problems, like missing or neglected sidewalks, bad traffic light behavior, huge parking lots everywhere to cross, etc.
But the bigger part IMHO is the stranger-danger paranoia. Google the free-range parenting movement here for a few disturbing stories. The media hypes up stories about rare child molesters who kidnap children off the streets for better viewership numbers, then people start to think that kidnappers are everywhere and you don't dare take your eyes off a kid for a minute. This makes its way into policy and expectations. Add that into the common viewpoint here that if you have a child, they must be the most important thing in your life and your entire life must be centered around improving the kid's life. You get a society where letting a child, or even teenager, walk to school seems so outrageously dangerous and irresponsible that kids may sometimes be picked up by the police and returned to their parents even though nothing is wrong, and the parents may sometimes even be investigated themselves for their supposedly wildly irresponsible behavior.
When I first went to school, my mother told me not to accept lollies, gifts or rides from strangers. The same fears existed, but people tempered those fears and kept paranoia in check.
What has most probably changed is the social attitude which has become far more judgemental and much more intolerant. I've given a lot of thought to these social attitudes and I see today's society as closer to the Torch and Pitchfork scenes in Beauty and the Beast (think of the feminist attack on Matt Taylor by The Verge as one of many examples of extreme verbal aggression by the masses). This mob intolerance has become popular and frequent in the last 10 or so years.
The media and political classes just creates an environment where it seems more dangerous for their own benefit. People who are constantly afraid buy more newspapers/click more news links and will vote to reduce their own rights. All the better if the dangers are essentially imaginary - the gravy train can keep running without worrying about figuring out something to do that actually solves the problem, or the problem going away once it's solved.
Most german friends I know of started earlier than 8:00 too (most started at 7:30). And yes I'm talking about actual lessons starting at that time - not "day care". Even though from our point of view there seemingly wasn't really a difference between those anyways...
This may not apply to urban families who take a train or bus to work. I commuted to high school on a subway by myself, and would have preferred leaving an hour or two later.
Also, living in a city isn't the only solution. I lived in a suburb ten miles away from the city but all 3 schools were <15 minute walks.
You hit the nail on the head with this one. High school hours are specifically set to end earlier than elementary and middle school hours. This is so that high schoolers can pick up their younger siblings and walk them home while parents are still at work.
Unless, of course, they need a ride to school.
Walking works great even when the roads are unusable for cars. The only relevant limit to walking in the winter is your clothing.
And it was easily possible to walk there, or later, bike there. (although I had to walk every now and so often when my bike broke down in -14°C in winter).
I don’t really see where the issue is?
Today, same school, same neighborhood, is a traffic jam every morning, as the kids are all driven to school. I could very well imagine parents saying that it's no longer safe to walk, due to the traffic. :-(
It was literally impossible to drive on the road for cars during the half hour each morning and afternoon where we kids were there.
Similar to Amsterdam or København
Every student on a residential college campus that's bigger than tiny is going to walk 3 or 4 times that in a day. Middle school students will stress their bodies a few orders of magnitude harder in sports practices (or even light exercise).
4km a day, or later 8km a day is nothing, and has never caused me or anyone else I know – and literally every child here does this – any issues.
Even today, when I’m bored and I know the bus will only come in 30min, I usually just walk 6km home from uni.
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I’m not even sure if your comment isn’t just satire, exaggerating the helicopter-mentality of some northamerican parents.
And yes, every specialist I've been to has said all I can do is try to protect my joints until I eventually decide I want surgery.
It was also easily the worst part of the day, so I can't blame parents from wanting to get their kids out of that.
In these places, everyone who matters politically has a car, everywhere they want to go has parking, roads are huge, etc. so there is no political will for expensive transit, and the surface area is too large to cover effectively with cheap transit.
It's not ideal, but I didn't have my parents drive me (I didn't have a car). I don't see why high school students can't do this.
Perhaps I should have clarified, there are no buses/trams/subways or any type of public transportation in my school district for high-school students to take, because there is no public transportation period in my city. The only options for going to school are walk, ride a bike, or drive, and the first two aren't practical during winter - that's besides the fact that I lived three miles away from the school.
There's no good reason for high school hours and parents work hours to be coupled, unless it is necessary for a parent to drive the kids to school on their way to work (i.e. because the bus is too slow and would require waking up hours earlier).
In which case the actual problem has nothing to do with education policy, and everything to do with the parents' decision to live in sprawl.