As the spring term continues, students have to manage a substantial homework load, especially if these students are in an AP class and extracurriculars like sports as well. The result: students are having to sacrifice sleep in order to maintain a good grade in a class.

Medical professionals say that teenagers need around eight to nine hours of sleep every night, but it’s difficult for us to complete all of our homework and, for those involved in athletics, go to practice as well. When there is already a commitment to a team, it’s hard to get out of practice for homework and the student would risk sacrificing playing time or missing something important.
To keep up, these students have to stay up until two or even later in order to accomplish the homework that teachers give them.

And as the years go on the amount of homework keeps increasing. Junior and senior year are supposedly the hardest years for high schoolers, especially because the amount of AP classes available is much greater than what is possible to take sophomore and freshman year. But, even the sophomores in one or two AP classes are having a hard time with that workload.

For students who participate in extracurricular activities, the amount of homework can be detrimental to their social life and sleep.

The weekend seems like an opportunity to get ahead on homework to make the week easier – though teachers will still give us more over the course of the week as well. We are then stuck doing homework the whole weekend rather than ever having a chance to be teenagers. And the weekend would also be the perfect time to catch up on sleep, instead of getting up early for school every morning and potentially going to sleep late due to the homework load.

Teachers should understand the challenges we put ourselves through to get good grades in classes to put ourselves on a good path in the future and in turn teachers should limit the amount of homework and focus on giving more impactful assignments to give a better understanding of the lesson that take less time.

Teachers could also collect all homework on a certain day in the week so students can manage their time while finishing all homework.