School serves as an exceedingly crucial time in a child’s life. With eight hours of school comes a substantial amount of homework that can undoubtedly make or break a student’s grade. A majority of people likely associate homework with success because scholars continue to practice and utilize the skills that they learned in school. However, it proves ineffective in most cases and students ultimately waste valuable time and energy during the process. 

A high percentage of teenagers and children involve themselves in after-school sports, clubs and extracurriculars, leaving them minimal time to complete homework. Numerous schools stress the importance of receiving eight hours of sleep every night but make it nearly impossible for that to become a reality. The hypocrisy does not resonate with a majority of students because they tend to feel overwhelmed with the lack of sleep and downtime that they acquire on a day-to-day basis. 

“When my son was in middle school, he would be with me during the weekend. The amount of homework he had from 6th grade to 8th grade was insane. We would spend the entire weekend doing an immense amount of homework. Also as a teacher, if it’s not 100% necessary and doesn’t contribute to what we’re doing in class the next day or week, then it’s a waste of time,” ELA teacher Spencer Jordan said.

Teachers claim to assign homework for students to practice and utilize the skills in which they acquired in school. However, homework does not always prove effective or directly correlate with success. In Finland, students attend school no more than three hours a day without a single homework assignment. Finnish schools believe that students retain information better with exposure to the world. They lead the world in global scores  

for math and science, debunking the theory that homework holds an essential purpose in students’ lives. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development states that the more time students spend on homework every night, the worse they perform in school.

“In other countries, it’s project-based learning. It’s ‘what can you do with what it is you have learned. It’s not homework, it’s not a test; they apply what it is that they learned to their real life,” Jordan said.

In the long run, the abolishment of homework would ultimately provide students with additional downtime and extra sleep, which will reset the scholar and allow them to reach their fullest potential in school. A proven correlation between homework completion and success does not always occur because developing minds must learn from the world around them rather than a book.