After reading this piece- boy, am I glad I graduated 20+ years ago. I feel sorry kids these days with regard to graduation requirements.

Creating another generation of obsessive compulsives. For what? To make more money to buy more unnecessary iPads. Where is the joie de vivre? They'll spend day and night working, literally, eating in their cars while they're texting their bosses.

The schools themselves need to take responsibility for loading on the work too. A 15 page paper is truly unnecessary as described in the article. What about an 8-10 pager? I never wrote that much in HS (20+ years ago) and got into an Ivy League school, b/c NO high schools were assigning that kind of ridiculous workload! I hear from friends (my kids are younger) that honors and AP classes have up to 2 hours of homework/night. EXCUSE ME?? I took maybe 3 of those in HS and NO WAY was there that much studying required. The schools need to back off. Kids are already there 7 plus hours/day. They should have a limit of 2 hours of homework per night TOTAL so they can sleep, eat, bathe, see their families and friends, and exercise (play a sport or just work out, etc). Sports too have gone over the top and require 2 plus hours/day after school. That needs to be limited across the board so that things are fair between the schools, and kids have time for the homework etc. Remember they are KIDS not adults.

I would like to point all parents and students dealing with stress, to listen to a talk Dr. Ken Ginsburg, gave a couple of weeks ago in this community. As part of his career, Ginsburg "aims to start a national dialogue among parents and children of all ages to redefine perceptions of success and evaluate the significant physical and emotional damage that stress and everyday pressures can have on development.
Web Link

It's not just high school that needs to lighten up on homework. What about the elementary schools? My daughter is now in 8th grade and she had weekly homework in Kindergarten and by 3rd grade, she was doing 3 hours of homework a night. Enough that I ended up doing some of it just because I felt sleep and play were more important for then writing papers.

Parents have to realize that they are tacitly endorsing the achievement/stress experience of their kids if they don't challenge it on their behalf. We can't just blame the school system because we are letting it happen. I've talked to parents who want things to change, but won't speak to teachers, administrators because they're going to 'get their kids in trouble.' As long as we think like this, nothing will change. Let's be constructive and respectful and challenge the ideas and protect our kids.

I have little sympathy for rich kids complaining. Think your life is stressful. Try attending a low-performing school like I did when you're trying to get into college. Then do a couple of years in military and then go to school at night while working full-time. Sorry. It doesn't get any easier after high school.

What these kids are asked to do in high school for homework is more than I was asked to do as an undergraduate in college. I personally find it absurd that elementary school age children have so much homework and that their days are scheduled to make sure that they don't miss out on anything, except freedom to daydream or play with friends. Of course I also have issues with organized sports at a young age too (I bought into it and now I have a 9 year old who already knows he's not good enough to be in baseball...when I was a kid that's when you started). I try to do as much as I can to reduce the stress brought on by school, but then I get stressed. Ugh.

I agree with some of the comments that it all starts too early. Kindergarten should NOT have homework at all!! Neither should 1st grade. They can barely read and write. It's really just homework for the parents, making sure they sit still and focus and so on, which they have already done for 7 hours! It messes up home life and interferes with play, imagination, exercise, and so on. Even the PTA recommended amount, of 10 mins/grade level per night which is "OK" til about middle school, is not adhered to (i.e. why then would a kinder get homework??). I have spoken up to many teachers; it is not easy to do and makes you unpopular as a parent, but it is absolutely necessary if the culture will ever change. Sometimes you are actually heard. Also if a school has a "policy" of a certain # of minutes per night, I have always insisted my kids stick to that. A lot of parents make the kids plow through it anyway. The teachers don't KNOW a lot of the time that the multiple pages in multiple subjects adds up to more than an hour for an 8 year old, for example.

I think they should do the homework at school at least for the regular weekly stuff, extend the school day with study hall or something, I mostly did my homework in the library after school with the "A" team, and then hung out with my "B" team friends after. In highschool you really can't avoid burning the midnight oil since they need to be getting ready for College which is really a full-time deal. Success in college is really about study skills and time management.

My kid is in honors classes, several activities, and yet somehow still manages to get a good night's sleep. The stress that teens feel occurs when parents ingrain the idea that A's are the only acceptable grade and your future might be ruined by a B. They should ease up on their kids - there is a lot of room between straight A's and complete failure - you can still have a bright future without a perfect 4.0. As for work for the younger kids, I guess we got lucky and never really had much homework, maybe a few minutes a night and a special project once a year.

I teach Advanced Placement at a school demographically similar to Los Altos. I see student stress and its negative effects every day. Although I lament the over-scheduled, stressful nature of college preparatory academics, there isn't all that much that we can do at the school level. We already make students and parents sign something when they enroll in more than 2 AP classes, and year after year, getting into college gets more competitive. Globalization is a fact of life at this point. As a society, we could choose to be less materialistic by distributing economic resources more equally, reducing the stakes for those striving to enter the white-collar professional world, but somehow I don't think the good people of Los Altos are ready to make that leap.

Complaining about homework loads is grossly unfair. I am proud of my challenging curriculum and its intellectual sophistication, as well as the scores students earn on the AP test itself. I could assign less work, get worse results, hurt my career, and end up with fewer students earning college credit or being prepared for college level work. Whose purpose does that serve?

As an institution, schools have little control over what colleges expect HS graduates to be able to do (which is entirely reasonable IMO), the amount of pressure parents and students put on themselves to be admitted to the most exclusive college possible, or the wide range of academic preparation of our incoming students. And frankly, if we want to reduce the stress of our highest-achieving students, we should allow them to start in on higher-order academics earlier in their careers. Middle Schools do not separate students by ability groups as much as High Schools for all sorts of social and political reasons, but there are costs to those choices, and those costs are intangible, borne by students who are sometimes taken for granted because of their tangible successes. Of course, challenging high-achieving students earlier would not work without also getting the community to buy into a less competitive mindset over college admissions, as students who could take fewer APs (etc.) and have a balanced life in HS and still go to an excellent college are not often content to do so, keeping the pressure on to achieve at an even higher level.

What could be seen as 6 years of learning spread over 6 years is back-loaded so to let those students who are developmentally not yet ready for "critical thinking" in 7th grade to catch up. The bigger value of equal opportunity takes precedence over arranging things so the most ambitious students can have a less ridiculous junior year. But that leaves us with 3 totally insane semesters to get our students prepared at a level commensurate with their interests and potential.

Check out "Doing School: How we are creating a generation of stressed out, materialistic, and miseducated students" by Denise Clark Pope. While not disclosed in the book, the school from which her case studies were drawn was Los Altos High. The SOS (Stressed Out Students) group at Stanford was born from her efforts. Apparently, not much has changed since 2004, when the book was originally published. Given the extra competition for college admission, it might even be worse.

LOL.
Always thought California is a beautiful place to bring up kids, but seems like time has changed, or parents have changed? Stress...sometimes lower self-esteem.

If one has to work so hard "since young age" to be a doctor/lawyer, and then get taxed at ~30%, life is quite mean:-) If this is done for self aspiration, good. But if it is done for the money and lifestyle, not quite worth it.
My cousin, with not much education, can make much more by managing around 30-50 workers. Making comfortable living, and not worrying about office politics. Then spend weekends fishing or something.

Does this kind of life still exist in Bay Area? I would like to know:-)

Schools simply respond to what local parents want. We live in a culture which believes that college education is a must, and kids must be pushed hard to do a lot - music, sports, academics, whatever, to stand out from other kids to get into the best schools.

This is all nonsense. College isn't right for everyone, nor are the most prestigious schools right for everyone. We're in the midst of a "college bubble" right now, which I think will change, and I hope that schools will shift over time to teaching useful life skills in addition to the three R's. Once upon a time, a college degree was a good investment in future employment, but that's no longer the case. We have college graduates working fast food, or other jobs not requiring that college degree. On the flip side, we have a shortage of skilled craftsmen, like welders and carpenters, and these jobs can often pay a lot better than the basic jobs college grads work. Naturally, this all depends on the degree one gets, and some college degrees like engineering and computer science are very marketable and have a good return on investment, but lots of majors, say, art history or philosophy have grim job prospects, yet those departments are also full of students.

This will change, it's unsustainable. I will encourage my own kids to pursue college if it makes sense for them once they get old enough, but I don't think that's as important anymore as a strong work ethic, a good general approach to academics, and lots of education at home. Curiosity needs to be nurtured, reading encouraged, and life skills need to be taught, but college prep stress may not be worth it. If you rob kids of their childhoods, you end up with basket cases.

If we'd just raise the minimum wage high enough, then no one here would need to learn anything in school. We could import all the tech workers from other countries, and reserve the simple jobs for the natives! Meanwhile, we'll insist upon rent control and subsidized housing, so that anyone born locally can still afford to live here in 'paradise', even while working a dummy job. And we could still complain about the lack of opportunity caused by importing foriegn workers, because that's our right as Americans!
Silicon Valley... on the cutting edge of progressive thought.

There is no simple answer on this issue. My child at LAHS has experienced all of these stress symptoms and more, but I don't blame the school, and we have not placed excess pressure or unrealistic expectations on our child to get straight A's or attend a top rated college. The counselors at LAHS have consistently advocated balance and stressed the need to not over commit, yet these kids still feel massive amounts of anxiety about their future. One of the contributing factors is simply the demographic makeup of this community. We are blessed to live in an area with highly educated, highly successful, driven parents who want the best for their kids. In my high school, it was the rare exception that someone was admitted to an Ivy, or Stanford, or MIT. We celebrated those achievements, but nobody else felt like a loser for not following suit. At LAHS, getting into these top schools seems to be much more common. Combine that with the huge increase in competition for spots at the "top" UC's and these kids set a bar for themselves that is not always realistic.

My child has a 3.2 GPA, plays two varsity sports, is active in community outreach, has scored "4" on two AP exams (which will yield college credit), and in the 90th percentile on the SAT. Very solid, but certainly won't secure admission to Stanford or the like. Unfortunately, our child is still deeply anxious about the future and whether or not admittance to ANY respectable college is realistic. No amount of reassurance from us makes a difference when they see what some of their peers are able to accomplish. We live deep in the long tail of the "bell curve" here, but to these kids this small community sets the bar for what is expected. I don't see any simple solution other than to continue to love and encourage your child and try to help them understand that there are MANY paths to success and happiness.

"My child has a 3.2 GPA, plays two varsity sports, is active in community outreach, has scored "4" on two AP exams (which will yield college credit), and in the 90th percentile on the SAT. Very solid, but certainly won't secure admission to Stanford or the like. "

Sorry to tell you this, but with a 3.2 GPA, your kid won't go to Stanford, true,but will also not get into any of the UC schools. I can understand wanting your child to have "balance", but with two sports, it's obvious that there is imbalance toward an activity that is interfering with their future.

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What a terrible message to send to our children. Some undereducated "executives" got caught up in the .com bubble to positions they would never have achieved otherwise and they trumpet to the world that education is not important--you can ride the bubble too!

Sorry buddy. Better buy a bigger couch, because your kid will be spending a lot of time on it when they eventually graduate from community college only to find out that they are no longer hire the uneducated.

By the way, it's sad you resorted to name calling...

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"But not everyone is capable of getting into a top school. "

Stanford is a top school.

UC schools are far below Stanford.

Your kid is well below UC level.

You have him spending most of his time pursuing a hobby (sports) rather than cracking the books. How many hours of tv a night? This is a sad situation that have such a low opinion of your child.

There are people that have done quite well without a quality education, but they are the exception, not the rule. All the data shows a correlation between education and salary/compensation. This includes the tier of the school too.

Thank you for sharing your story with the community. Hopefully other parents in a similar situation will recognize that saving their kid from some stress now will likely give them a lifetime of misery.

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Please parents, do not encourage your children to succeed in academics. Sports do much more in developing our future workforce. If you are worried that your stress-free child will not be employable, rest assured that a place can always be found for them here: Web Link

Right @Opportunity, because that's exactly what is being advocated here. Judgmental narrow mindedness is not a hallmark of intelligence.

Why are you all so critical of how other people school their kids? It's none of your business.

Actually, It Is Our Business (iiob). The next generation is OUR nation's future and when we have people exercising their "parental rights" to prevent their kids from being able to be successful, it affects us all. Go ahead and do what you want with YOUR kids, but don't expect the rest of us to stay silent when you loudly and proudly advocate your program of undereducation. Sorry if the First Amendment (ever hear of "free speech") offends you...maybe you were daydreaming when it was covered in school??

Nobody here is doing or advocating what you are whining about. Get off your high horse and actually try to *understand* the different perspectives offered here.

I think I understand. Almost every other industrialized country in the world sends their kids to schools for more time during the year (summers off? why???) than American kids. There is one person in this thread complaining about a massive TWO HOURS of homework during the evening for the honors and AP kids. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!? When did two hours become a massive amount of study?

No wonder silicon valley companies have to hire overseas. Irresponsible parents have their head in the sand about the increasingly complex world we live in. If parents would consistently require and support two hours/night of study from when their children are very young, it wouldn't be stressful. Stress comes in when the parents think that 30 minutes is enough to learn 4-6 subject areas. Reading ahead? Forget it--not in 30 minutes. Don't understand a concept? Blow it off--no time! Got to watch my TV program. Hey, what a cute little facebook update! :)

The worst is the parents who excuse their child from academics by allowing them to play games. Sure, it's a lot of fun, for both the kid and their parents...but is it RESPONSIBLE? Absolutely not.

What a narrow, pathetic view. Every year, Los Altos high school sends multiple student athletes to places like Stanford, Yale, MIT, Johns Hopkins, UCLA, etc. Not to mention the "lesser" schools you so condescendingly dismiss. Academics must be a top priority for our children, but without things like art, music, athletics, etc. we will breed a generation of automatons. What "Understanding" seems to believe is that the full measure of a persons value is how much money they earn. Pretty warped view. What about a Stanford grad who chose to major in something like comparative literature and worked as an editor at a small publishing house making maybe $75K a year? Is that person a failure in your mind? I'm done arguing with you. Education is a huge priority around here, but you have a seriously twisted perspective.

"Academics must be a top priority for our children, but without things like art, music, athletics, etc. we will breed a generation of automatons. "

Nobody ever said that art and music weren't important. You state that academics must be a top priority, yet the parent above is clearly prioritizing sports over academics. How many hours / week does the kid spend on academic homework vs sports? Between practices, working out, games, etc...We all know sports will have more effort than academics.

You then go on: "What about a Stanford grad who chose to major in something like comparative literature..."

Again, we are not talking about the student this parent posted about above. With a lousy 3.2 GPA, Stanford or any above average schools are out of the picture. Sure, a lot of schools can give a decent education, but given the prioritization of sports over academics, who really believes that this kid will learn much.

So, yes... "Pathetic" is aptly named.

Ok, oh wise guru of parenting and education, you seem to be pretty free with the pointed criticism of other parents and their children if they don't conform to your exalted standards. How about a face to face discussion, say over coffee, to discuss this a bit more in person? I'd be interested to see how free you are with your insults and advice then. Serious offer: crawl out from behind your keyboard and have a legitimate, old fashioned conversation. You can reach me at nuke_laloosh@yahoo.com

Don't we get one of these articles about every high school every few years? (yes)

only it's usually the (bi)yearly magazine or paper at the school.

Why would anyone want to meet face to face with you? Most of your postings have violated the rules of polite society and have been deleted by Voice staff. Is this how you instruct your child on communicating with other community members? If so, then all the stress you are protecting your kid from is going to come down on them like a ton of bricks once they leave the nest... IF they leave the nest.

@Insults? -- Oh,I don't know, maybe I wanted to see if you had the courage of your convictions and could make the kinds of statements you make on-line when actually sitting across the table from someone. I guess not. And don't expect a civil response when you launch criticism and insult at what was initially a statement of empathy.

But let's move on: Since you are so free with the advice and judgement, let's hear your story. With the positions you take on this topic, you must be some "master of the universe" whose individual academic prowess and discipline has yielded a life of personal and professional greatness. So let's hear it. What specific outcomes of your own qualify you to pass judgement?

"...you must be some "master of the universe" ..."

From your viewpoint, perhaps... I just can't understand a parent who claims to be educated wanting to deprioritize education for their own child. If having a belief that investing early in a child's development would enable a less stressful life in the future makes me a "master", then so be it.

Frankly, I think I'm just an average MV resident.

Nice try @badly, but if you deign to render a verdict on others, at least give some objective evidence of your qualifications. No "average Mountain Virw resident" would make your statements unless they had the personal credibility to back them up. Again, what in your personal achievements allows you to pass judgement?

What is a "Mountain Virw resident?" I am unfamiliar with a place called Mountain Virw. Please keep posting. You are making my point brilliantly!

Ah yes, feel free to point out the iPad induced typos, but avoid answering the actual question. Look Judge Dredd, just tell us what you've accomplished that gives you license to render verdict on others?

"With a lousy 3.2 GPA, Stanford or any above average schools are out of the picture. "


Obviously you've never read the Bootboard where stanford alums excitedly discuss 3.0 GPA students who have 1300 SATs and what they can bring to the football team if only they will sign

More nuggets of wisdom from the self-proclaimed Best Parent of "Mountain Virw":

1) Blame the tool, not the man: "Ah yes, feel free to point out the iPad induced typos..."
2) Reference comic books to support your point: "Look Judge Dredd..."

Did you even LISTEN to your child?

"Unfortunately, our child is still deeply anxious about the future and whether or not admittance to ANY respectable college is realistic. "

He/she is rightfully worried about their future. Not about getting into "Stanford" or a top tier school, but just getting into something "respectable." Two varsity sports??? I wonder who pushed them into that? How can you possibly blame the school district or even the zip code?? You are the parent. Responsibility lays at your doorstep, unfortunately.

@iiob

Wow, the twisting of words and hyperbole here is quite impressive.

Nobody is proposing under educating children. They indeed are the future of society, and we need to raise them to be intelligent, principled, hard working people. In my own opinion, this has little to do with their institutional education, and much more to do with the environment in which they learn how to learn, which is mainly at home. School kills the joy of learning and teaches children not to question, since it focuses on rote memorization rather than critical thinking skills.

I've interviewed hundreds of college grads for tech jobs, and over the years, I've realized it's not the college they went to which matters, but their approach to learning new things, work ethic, and interpersonal skills.

Where I come from, not everyone goes to college, some kids go to trade school and learn useful job skills since college isn't for them. Some of my friends are mechanics and carpenters, but they're far more educated than university grads because they're curious, they read a lot, and they explore. Their education is much more broad versus single subject specialists who only do what is required to get a degree.

So, back to what I said - how I raise my kids is none of your business. Your assumption is that I'm creating some kind of failures, but you have no basis for that assumption based on what I said about college not necessarily being right for everyone. I'll definitely encourage my kids to go and encourage them to do well academically, however, if this is turning them into young stress cases who need Xanax, I'll rethink my decisions.

"In my own opinion, this has little to do with their institutional education, and much more to do with the environment in which they learn how to learn, which is mainly at home."

Agreed. Without proper support at home to focus their development, schools have an uphill battle in helping shape our future leaders and scientists. It's a shame that parenting classes are not a mandatory part of our core curriculum. Our children are All of Our Business, but many parents are ill equipped to get it right. (As some of the commentary in this thread shows.) Pointing fingers at the schools after the damage is done is disingenuous at best...

A student in the 90th percentile on SAT's even with a 3.2 will have no problem getting into many private colleges with good reputations.

These monster schools aren't all they are cracked up to be.

Consider that career wise the graduates of UC and Stanford are facing imported labor in technical fields. Less than 25% of STEM graduates get jobs in STEM fields anyway. I'll bet that the ones who do might well be the ones that stand out by having gone through a different path than the masses, who are just another UC graduate anyway. Other factors determine job success. It's a sad time we live in.

And if this student with a 120 IQ wants to go to law school or business school, he'll have a very easy time getting there. And at that point, it won't matter one bit what undergraduate college he attended.

Oh, and don't rule out larger private schools like Stanford and USC. For that matter, UC has many campuses, and not all are as popular as Berkeley. It's wrong to think a 3.2 student won't get into to some of these options. The main reason UC is popular is because of its lower tuition, but that is not so low any more. Also, the private schools have a lot of scholarships available and often it's cheaper for middle income students to attend the private schools anyway!

I don't care if my kid ever goes to college. Not everyone is born with brains. I wasn't and I done pretty well.