Benefit

   Homework. Every high school student, including myself, has come to dread it. Depending on the teacher, and the class, students may spend hours working on assignments. But as students, they aren’t aware of how much this really benefits them.

   For instance, to be good at math it takes practice. There have been numerous times when I believed I would never be able to understand how to solve a certain problem or understand a formula. However, when I attempted the homework and used videos or notes to aid me, I realized that it was not as difficult as I thought it would be. Would I have done the homework in the first place if it was not due? I guess I will never know for sure, but I do know that it helped me get an A in math. 

   Having five classes every day and actually going to them is work in itself. I’m constantly busy studying for tests. When a teacher does not attach points to an assignment or make it mandatory, I probably will not prioritize it and will eventually never get around to it. Teachers give homework with the intention that they will benefit students. Without doing homework, we are depriving ourselves of the resources and knowledge that will help us succeed more efficiently in class. 

   In addition, homework can allow test scores to have less impact on an overall grade. Some students are not great test takers. If there is no category in the grade book for homework, the percentage worth for tests is going to be higher. Doing homework, and getting those easier points, can give students a buffer for their test scores.In some classes, I was able to achieve the letter grade I wanted by just a few points. More than likely, those points came from doing my homework. 

   I know it is difficult to be motivated to do work after school every day, but the students who complain about how grades should reflect test scores and not homework completion are hypocritical. If a student does not have good habits of doing daily assignments, why would the student have good studying habits for tests? 

   If teachers make homework mandatory, not only are students getting helpful practice and learning what they need to prepare for class, but they are also getting points that can boost their grades.

– Olivia Brown, Associate Editor

   Unnecessary Stress

   I have grown to despise homework, for all of the late hours working on assignments to even just the daily math problems. But does it really help? Countless hours at home, suffering at a desk — is it all for nothing? 

   Yes, all those hours have been consistently wasted. 

   Take a class like biology, with tons of homework all the time. I had to google the answers just to finish the paper for the deadline. Then the practice test provided completely new information I had not seen before, but I still managed to pass the tests. Homework was no help in any of these many circumstances. 

   Few students review homework assignments or papers when preparing for a test because of the amount of useless and irrelevant information it contains. Instead, we look at external sites such as Khan Academy to study. Studying using external sites accomplishes what homework tries to, except more efficiently.

   For example, in my eighth-grade year, I took integrated 1A and 1B math. Our teacher did not teach us at all — we had no lessons, lectures, assignments, or activities. Instead, we had to rely on the textbook, and all of the homework from the book. Most kids had a test average of 65 percent, and I had a test average of 63 percent. 

   This does not mean we were bad at math. I am currently in Integrated 2B and I have not yet done a single homework assignment for myself, my grade and test average are both 94 percent. The difference in the grades is because of the instruction given, not the homework assigned.

   Paired with extracurriculars, a student’s free time for homework is decreasing more and more. We cannot just stop extracurriculars either. Modern-day college applications for competitive schools expect more and more activities to set us apart, and they take time homework doesn’t allow for. Because we have less time, most students end up doing their homework at night when they should be asleep. This lack of sleep decreases the attention spans of students and the quality of their learning in class, which is much more important than assigned homework.

   I do not believe that we should get rid of homework entirely, it can still provide some help and practice for those who need it, but I also do not believe homework should be assigned as a daily or weekly requirement. Homework should be offered as an extra resource, but not anything more.

– Ryan Gage, Staff Writer