It’s 6:00 a.m, and your hand can’t hit the alarm clock any faster. You’re still tired from yesterday, which only ended a few hours ago. You think about everything you will have to do and everything you should’ve already done. You get out of bed, afraid you’ll miss the 6:50 a.m bus pick-up.

You sit in school for seven hours and do three more hours of homework once you get home, but you’re still not done. You have to go to practice after that. Two hours of physically demanding work. You get home and now you are tired not only mentally, but physically, too. You’re still not done. There’s a shift waiting with your name on it at the restaurant you work for. When you finally get home for good, it’s late and there is still work to be done, but you’re too tired. I’ll do it tomorrow, you tell yourself.

It’s ridiculous. Everybody expects great things from a bunch of sleep-deprived teenagers who are trying to figure out not only math, but themselves. High schoolers these days base their “free time” off of school, homework and responsibilities. Responsibility is a good thing, but when it’s shoved upon you along with a history paper and three pages of math homework, it’s not as great.

The recommended amount of sleep for the average teenager is nine and a half hours. If you are going to bed at 11:00 p.m. because that’s when you get home from work or are finishing your homework, you would have to get up at 8:30 a.m. Remember, school starts at 7:45 a.m. Most of the people in this school are not getting nearly enough sleep.

All the students are stressed and tired and that doesn’t make for a happy school environment, like the one staff push for, does it?