The American education system is my life—five out of the
seven days of the week I am in school from 7 AM to 2 PM or later.
It’s funny how the American education system is also the
death of me.
I learned in seventh grade health class (a required course
might I add) that teenagers need eight to ten hours of sleep a night, as they
are in their prime time of growth. However, the National Sleep foundation
reports that only 15% of teens get at least 8.5 hours of sleep per night.
Colleges want kids that do everything. They look for someone who can take heavy
courses in school, then juggle extracurricular programs after school including
clubs, sports, community service, competitions, and a social life to make
connections. However, this is obviously too wordy for the millions of
letters and emails colleges send out every day so instead they euphemize it to “time
management.”
Time management is no longer a term of how quickly you can
finish your activities because there are just some events in scheduling that
the student cannot control. However, teens are able to manipulate their sleep
schedules, so time management is just “who can function the best on the
littlest amount of sleep?”
A lot of homework tonight? Sports right after school, and
band concert in the evening? No problem, we can just sleep tomorrow during class
and pull an all-nighter tonight.
This is the mind of the youth nowadays. But it’s okay, the
bags under my eyes are designer.
This explains my views of the education system in words that I couldn't form myself. As I read this I realized that I was nodding to myself and saying "I know" under my breath at every sentence.
ReplyDeleteGreat use of Wallace's tone and style. I very much agree with how you feel about sleep and school, it is out of proportion! Great post!
ReplyDelete"The bags under my eyes are designer." Wow, that pun was amazing! You really captured the essence of Wallace's tone in your post, while also making a convincing argument. Great job!
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about writing about the same thing! Another thing that I thought about was how we learn subjects and study for them everyday one year and then the next year forget everything. Really interesting, Ing :)
ReplyDeleteI usually like to spread my comments around and not comment on a blog that already has a bunch. That said, I am reading this at 11:40 at night thinking, "at least I am not alone." I really wonder if it does ruin growth to not sleep from all the school work because I average 6.5 hours of sleep a night.
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