Opinion: High school students are worked too hard
PHOTO Riann Masi
March 10, 2022
Looking at high school students’ responsibilities, whether it be sports, academics or employment, there are quite a lot of things piled on their shoulders. High school students are being worked too hard and barely have any free time away from school and their responsibilities. Students who have jobs and after school activities can struggle to find time with how much work they’re given.
“Students are overly stressed,” senior Jordyn Bliss said. “They have way too much pressure put on them by the school system and as a student going to school five days a week for seven hours a day.”
In a Google Form survey that was presented to Fenton High students on March 3, where 40 responses were recorded on the topic of sleep and homework during the school week, 32.5 percent said they only receive an average of six hours of sleep per night. The Centers for Disease Control stated in an article that teenagers 13-18 should sleep 8-10 hours a night, and getting less than eight hours is not enough time for teenagers to function through a school day and after school activities.
“I believe that assigning excessive amounts of homework to a student is not okay for their mental and physical well-being,” sophomore Kyla Marx responded to this form by saying. “By assigning excessive amounts of homework each night, students are not getting the recommended hours of sleep they need to be able to function during the day. There is time for school, and then there is time for home, and I feel that those two things should remain separate. Students should not be staying up until one in the morning working on school work outside of school hours. They should be participating in out of school activities and actually enjoying themselves rather than stressing themselves out and developing an unstable mindset.”
On top of a seven-hour, five-day week, students are taught six subjects a day, which doesn’t leave enough time for employment, sports or any extra curricular activities. On top of not having time for other activities, little motivation is left after a seven-hour school day to do homework.
Time management is a huge aspect of school work. Students are taught at a young age that a worksheet can take from 15 minutes to an hour. Students also know that when they get home and do homework immediately, they could have more time later for other activities.
According to an article by The Washington Post, “High schoolers reported an average of 2.7 hours of homework per weeknight.” That accumulates to around 7.7 hours for the five days students are at school. From the Google Form information collected from FHS students, 25 percent of students only spend an hour on homework a night during weekdays, while 22.5 percent of students spend 2 hours a night on homework.
If each class teacher gives homework to students, they have a responsibility to finish the work that night. “If teachers gave students less homework and more time in class to ask questions,” Bliss said, “students wouldn’t be as stressed about how much homework they have to finish that night.”
On top of homework, students may have jobs they attend to after school, which doesn’t give them much time to finish homework. Some jobs may be part-time, but with a school schedule, they are attended at night. In Michigan, students ages 14-15 are allowed eight hours of work per day and 48 hours per week. For students ages 16-17, they can work up to 24 hours during the school week, according to Michigan Labor Laws.
Some students are also a part of extracurricular activities, such as sports and clubs. Being a part of these activities can cause students to have less time to do the work they are assigned. “As a student athlete it is hard sometimes to finish school work on time,” senior Jessica Dunkel said. “Most nights I am up until midnight trying to finish school work after getting home from practice. It’s stressful to have to worry all practice whether or not I can get my work done tonight or rush through finishing it in classes the next day.”
Between sports, a job and multiple pages of homework a night, high school students are worked too hard. Teenagers shouldn’t have to worry whether or not they can finish the hours of homework given in class that day. Students shouldn’t have to leave a seven-hour school day to be followed home with school work.
