Homework over Thanksgiving Break is one of the many academic boogeymen that haunt the students of Lake Forest Academy. The practice of assigning homework over Thanksgiving Break is extremely unpopular amongst students for a variety of reasons. Many feel that it is a practice that undermines the idea of longer breaks. While school policy mandates that there is to be no homework assigned over Thanksgiving Break, long term assignments that were assigned prior and due after do not have this stipulation applied to them. However, students often feel that they are at a disadvantage if they don’t work on these assignments over break.

  The idea of letting students get ahead in their schoolwork over long breaks is a good one, but only if done correctly. Making students feel like they are pressured into working over break, which adds mental strain to break that is wholly unnecessary and counterproductive. Thanksgiving Break is a time to celebrate family and destress before the hectic finals season begins, and when students have long-term assignments over break it takes away from time that could be spent with relatives. While this practice may allow teachers to fit more material into their curriculum, the pressure to decide between family and school creates significant amounts of preventable stress.

  Boarders, who have not seen their family in weeks, should not have to choose between spending time with their family or doing their schoolwork. For many, it is the only time that they will be able to be with their family before Winter Break begins.

  “As students, we work so hard throughout the year, and you would expect them to give us a break during our break, but instead they prolong our work to stretch over our rest time,” says All School President Teni Bakare.

  This sentiment is echoed by students, who find that teachers are often willing to assign longer-term assignments over Thanksgiving Break, much to the frustration of the student body. Stress is already a constant factor among students, and giving students work over Thanksgiving Break only increases the number of stressors that students are exposed to. This stress decreases the productivity of students, and can slow down or prevent students from using the recovery period that Thanksgiving Break offers.

Homework over Thanksgiving Break is unfortunately common, but is certainly disliked by the vast majority of students.