Packs Are a Pain in the Neck--and Back

Leslie Boler, a Newport Beach sixth-grader, woke up Thursday morning complaining of back pain.

The culprit: a backpack weighed down with 8.8 pounds worth of textbooks, binders and paper. And this was only the third day of school.

It’s a complaint parents and administrators say they are hearing a lot this week, as students stream back to school this year carrying heavier and heavier backpacks, causing them to lean over--and sometimes fall over--as they shuffle between classes.

Doctors say that extra weight is leading to headaches, back and neck pain and muscle soreness among more children and teens than ever before. Some say it even contributes to scoliosis, or curving of the spine.

“Kids are toting more and more,” said Kurt Johnson, a Lake Forest chiropractor. “We see kids with back pain, and certainly, with the increase in weight of book bags, that incidence is growing.”

Johnson said that despite his warnings, his two grade-school-age children insist on carrying backpacks that weigh up to 25 pounds on some days.

“My little girl is only 75 pounds, that’s 30% of her body weight,” he said. “This can cause all kinds of muscle strain. It could cause joint problems. If kids have misalignments, it could accentuate that.”

One reason students have resorted to carrying heavy packs is that many schools have done away with lockers, which they claim attract vandals and contribute to tardiness, noise and mess.

School Districts Respond to Problem

In response, some districts have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase two sets of textbooks so students can keep one at home instead of lugging them back and forth. Teachers urge students to clean out their backpacks. Principals send letters home advising parents to purchase small bags that cannot hold too much or to purchase packs that roll.

After a fire destroyed lockers six years ago at Thurston Middle School in Laguna Beach, the PTA chipped in and bought a second set of books so students could leave the heavy tomes at home and get through the day without lockers.

The new program seemed to work. The school was cleaner, without trash falling out of lockers. The parents were pleased with the second set of books. But many backpacks didn’t get smaller or lighter, said Principal Ron LaMotte.

Befuddled, administrators asked students what they were carrying around. They were startled at what came out of the bags: skateboards, in-line skates, extra books, water bottles.

“Lots of extra things that weren’t really necessary,” LaMotte said. “If they needed notebook paper, they’d have a whole ream, instead of just what they needed.”

LaMotte said this problem was particularly pronounced among the school’s smallest students, the sixth-graders, perhaps because they were nervous about attending middle school and wanted to be prepared with any possessions that could help them through the day.

So this year, in an effort to cut down on the weight, administrators did away with a rule requiring students to have three-ring binders, and instead purchased brightly colored cardboard folders for each subject.

Medical organizations such as the American Physical Therapy Assn. and the American Chiropractic Assn. have published backpack safety tips. Backpack manufacturers have redesigned packs to distribute the weight more evenly. But many students pay little attention. Teens, wanting to look cool, often sling their backpacks over one shoulder or loosen the straps so the bags hang low on their backs, putting too much strain on the shoulders. And parents say that student workloads have increased, prompting students to bring more books home each night. Some students are packing their bags with items for team sports, child-care programs or extracurricular activities.

In the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District, officials sent home a newsletter warning parents that backpacks should be no more than 10% of a student’s body weight, said John Bellows, assistant principal of El Dorado High.

But Lisa Boler, Leslie’s mother and the PTA Council president of the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, said she does not see an easy solution to the heavy loads students are forced to carry.

Her two older children, who attend Newport Harbor High School, have lockers, but they don’t always use them because there’s not enough time to get across campus during passing periods, she said. Leslie attends Mariners Elementary School.

Boler added that heavy backpacks sometimes cause problems not just for her ailing children, but for the whole family. “My children say they can’t do any help around the house because their backs hurt,” she said.

Times staff writer Anna Gorman contributed to this report.