Today, if you were to take a school-wide survey about how students are feeling about the quality of their education, many students would say something along the lines of 'bad,' or 'horrible.' Very few would say 'good,' or moderately 'okay.'
The way schools are set up now makes it very hard for students with mental health issues as well as disabilities to learn, and retain topics taught throughout the semester. Schooling now depends on how well your memory is, instead of using your basic skills to figure a problem out.
When students are given hours of homework, how are they supposed to take care of themselves? The average teenager needs 8-10 hours of sleep every night. How is this possible to keep up with when these students are given hours of homework, participate in out-of-school activities, extra-curricular activities and spend time with their families? To expect students who have a tight schedule to sleep the right amount, eat the right amount, and have the right amount of free-time is absolutely asking too much. They basically only have a few choices; a) Maintain a social life, lose sleep, keep a high GPA. b) Sleep well, maintain a social life, have a low GPA. or c) Sleep well, keep a high GPA, lose a part of your social life. The choices for students are very limited. School does not need to be as stressful as it is. Yes, time management is a key skill you will need to learn early on, however, when finals come and teachers cram a lot of large projects together, it just isn't fair.
The way schools should be organized is that they should let the students choose their own paths. There isn't exactly a 'freedom of choice' in high school because you need an exact amount of credits to earn your diploma. If schools let their students choose their paths with a fixed amount of credits, (within said field they decide to learn,) student attendance would peak.
Students regularly don't attend their classes because they 'don't need them,' or 'don't find them interesting enough.' If the student chose their field, they would (hopefully) attend said classes. If the student chose a field they were interested in, why wouldn't they?
In my conclusion, the education system needs to make a drastic change. High school is where you learn to become an adult, so why not let the students have a say in what they learn? Life is not exactly easy trying to keep up a 4.0 GPA alongside all the activities these students participate in. Let the students' voices be heard.
