There ain't no rest for the wicked

We’re now finishing up the third week of school. Labor Day has passed, summer has unofficially ended, and we’re starting to get into the swing of things. Teachers are getting back in their game and students are getting back into the habit of late to bed, early to rise. 

This is one thing that has always frustrated me about school. Modern science recommends that teenagers get around nine hours of sleep. And during the summer, most teens get that much sleep, despite staying up until one in the morning. However, once school starts, things change. Even if a teen was fully dedicated to getting that much sleep, doing so and succeeding in school would be near impossible.

At school, students are encouraged to get involved in sports, clubs, extracurricular activities, and challenging classes. However, if a student was to do all this, they would for sure be lacking in sleep. 

I’ll first start with sports. School sponsored sports, and non-school sponsored sports, will often have practices daily, lasting at least one hour. Then add on the likelihood of having at least one game or competition a week and we see the availability of the student to participate in other things decreasing. 

 Clubs will also have the same effects as sports, although not usually quite the impact. But depending on how involved in said club a student wants to be can change how much time is needed to devote to it.

Now for extracurricular activities. Be it show choir, band, orchestra, drama, or some other activity, each takes up a large chunk of a student’s time after regular school hours end. Practices after school, performances, individual practices; all consume a lot of time. 

Lastly, I would like to point out the emphasis on taking challenging classes, be they advanced or Advanced Placement. These classes often require much time to be devoted to either studying the material or completing homework assignments. Often times, teachers will say that they assign about an hour of homework each night. Considering most students take six classes, that could mean up to six hours of homework.

Now, let’s say a student is in one sport, one extracurricular, and is taking three AP classes. That student would likely have a two hour of practice after school. It is now five o’clock. That student may go home to eat dinner, but will most likely have to return to school for the practice for the extracurricular activity, which could last as long as three hours. That student would likely get home around nine. If said student went to bed immediately when he or she got home, in order to get the suggested nine hours of sleep, that student would have to get up at six. 

However, our student is in three AP classes. That means it is around eleven o’clock when he or she is able to go to bed. Now, to get the full nine hours, the student would have to sleep until eight. Funny, that’s when school starts. 

I didn’t even go into working, but it would take no less than a miracle to allow a student to work as well as be involved in school and get the advised amount of sleep. 

Our schools demand involvement and then berate students when they don’t get enough sleep, causing their performance level to drop. It’s a vicious cycle that repeats itself until you graduate. That is of course, unless you’re attending college. Then you get four more years of sleep deprivation.