By Julia Burke

What is a well rounded student? For starters, a well rounded student is a kid who gets good grades, plays a few sports, is involved in a few clubs and student leadership, has a well balanced social life, and is healthy. The fundamentals of  WHS and High Schools around the world make it impossible for its students to be “well rounded” in this day and age, and students are held to unavailing standards.

So how are students supposed to find the time to play a sport, go to meetings, talk to friends, and get preferably straight As with maybe a few Bs, AND manage to go to bed at 10 pm in order to get the recommended 8 hours of sleep for the average high school kid? The answer is; there is no way. Students must sacrifice aspects from one of these qualifications that make up a well rounded kid in order to come close to achieving this. Personally, I usually end up sacrificing my social life in order to keep up with my school work, club meetings, sleep, and sports. Students like me, who sacrifice their social life in order to keep up, can miss out on school events like an under the lights game or a dance. So is a kid who has to sacrifice one of the aspects in order to keep up really well rounded?

In a meeting with your guidance counselor, you have probably discussed the college application process, or simply your activities resume. Building up an application and forming to fit the ideal applicant’s mold is what high school is all about-getting involved and doing well. However this is no longer possible to the average student. Honors classes at WHS assign 30 minutes to an hour of homework a night, and AP classes assign anywhere from 45 minutes to 2 hours. The ideal applicant to college will take mostly Honors and AP classes, with maybe a few level 3 classes. This leaves these students doing an average of 4-5 hours of homework a night depending on the number of these classes they are enrolled in, plus another hour or two for their level 3 homework assignments. Not to mention the amount of time they may spend studying in order to do well on an exam. This leaves the ideal and well balanced student with around 7 hours of homework to do after numerous other commitments. A well balanced student is unrealistic due to the unachieveable standards they are held to.

High School is the time in a person’s life that they are supposed to enjoy while learning about themselves and exploring. How are students supposed to do this when they’re swamped with homework and studying to do, play at an away game in Quabbin where they’re supposed to try their hardest for the team, go to their meeting so they don’t let their club down, and go to bed at 10pm? This leaves almost no free time for a student to hang out with friends and pursue out of school interests such as practicing an instrument or reading a book of choice.

So, WHS, what needs to be done? For starters, I believe homework should be cut back in all classes. “Busy work” assignments that teachers frequently assign just so that students are doing something for their class needs to be put to an end; there is no point in coloring a picture when we are in high school and are becoming mature adults. Eliminating busy work could potentially cut down a student’s workload by anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour, which makes all the difference in a students day.

There are many more things WHS could do to cut back on workload in order to make aspiring well-rounded student’s lives a bit easier, like starting school later in the morning or reevaluating teacher’s necessity to give out homework.  Overall, the students of WHS and High school’s everywhere are pressured to be all-around students, when this request is just no longer realistic.