Do teachers give too much work, or are students just lazy?

“It’s really hard when you have a heavy workload because it just really pulls you out of your life. It’s nice to have some balance. I get to work and enjoy that part of me, but then I have time to have a life and be with my kids” stated the actor Blair Underwood. It really is true you need the perfect balance in work and social life. Some people tend to think otherwise. From what I’ve heard, teachers say they think that they give too little work, while students think it is too much work and they end up not turning anything in. Alternatively, teachers give no work and students complain. Someone is in the wrong here.

Some students rarely have any time to do any homework at all. In the past, I’ve heard teachers complaining that they have a hard time figuring out what to do for a “next lesson,” or they complain about grading students’ work. When the students find time to do homework it will usually only be some classes they work on, not all. Teachers spend a lot of time outside of school grading and planning. Teachers give out a lot of work for several reasons, but why is it that teachers have the necessity to give that volume of work? “It’s their prerogative. it is their choice to do it. If I’m in a math class, the argument I always hear is ‘They do not need fifty problems to know how to do it’. They might not need fifty problems to do it, but I need fifty problems to make sure they will always know how to do it. So in certain classes that is very important. It all comes down to the student and the teacher,” stated Mr. Zachary Butt, a social studies teacher at Pahrump Valley High School. 

This can take a toll on a student’s mental health too. Percy Steed, a student at Pahrump Valley High School, commented, “I think teachers think that students do not really care about school when it is not like that at all. When in reality, people have things going on at home, at school, things we can not control, so there is no time for homework. Sometimes teachers can’t seem to understand that.” Teachers might not be able to understand what goes on in a student’s head or what’s going on at home. The same thing for the students who don’t know how the teacher is doing at home. “The students here are so used to getting minimum work that over the years they think any work is too much work, but to know something for a really long time I don’t think understanding is enough for that… depends if they get enough work to apply it to a real-life situation… you might need a lot of work in order to master something.” Mr. Butt stated. 

During the world pandemic teachers have noticed that students did not turn in most of the work they gave. Was it because it was online and nowhere near the school? Some people didn’t even have wifi at home, and consequently no way to turn in anything either. Teachers’ Google Meets would fail and lose connection because of poor internet. Now that everyone is back in school and so many teachers and students still do not have the internet at home, there is no way to do the work teachers assign at home or teachers can’t grade anything