Students constantly battle sleep deprivation, but the truth is that naps throughout the week are actually beneficial in many ways. As long as you can control your naps, definitely take advantage of catching some zzz's between classes and outings.

Napping can improve:

Short-term memory

Capacity to learn

Ability to retain information

Mental and emotional health

Alertness

Creativity

Stamina

Sensory Perception

Pulling an all-nighter can actually make it harder for students to understand and remember the information they are cramming. It's actually better that they take short naps between studying. Also, the more sleep deprived you are, the easier it is for alcohol to affect your body.

Underclassmen need to sleep up to 10 hours to feel rested. Even if you can't sleep, laying down to rest can lower your blood pressure and calm your mind and body.

The body becomes naturally tired between 2-4am and 1-3pm. The best time to nap is in the early afternoon as you get tired so you can rest, but you don't ruin your nighttime sleep.

Try testing out the "NASA nap". This is a 26 minute nap that is said to improve your performance by 24% and your alertness by 54%.

The length of time you nap can also affect the type of sleep you get:

The power nap, or 10-20 minute nap: can boost your alertness and energy. Plus, you don't quite hit the non-rapid eye movement (NREM) stage so you can wake up without feeling groggy.

A 30 minute nap: will still allow you to feel the benefits of napping, but can cause you to feel groggy when you wake.

Hour long naps: best for improving your fact memory and it allows you to reach the deepest type of sleep. Though this is great, you may feel groggy after.

A 90 minute nap: allows your body to go through a full sleep cycle, including REM sleep. Your emotional memory improves as well as your creativity. You can easily wake up without feeling groggy!

Take these tips and use them well! I better see some bright-eyed faces soon!