As second semester nears the end, seniors everywhere are getting hit hard with senioritis. This is evident at WY as grades drop as well as attendance – not just for seniors, but for all students getting tired of school. “School has completely deteriorated my mental health. I have no motivation to go to class or do my work anymore,” explained Mikol Tsopnang ‘18. But the source of this is much more than laziness; rather, it can be accredited to a broken school system.

America’s school system today is one in which students are forced to learn material that is irrelevant and uninteresting to them. It is one in which creativity and individualism are suppressed, while conformity and conventionality are enforced. Sure, states and school districts may think they are helping foster well-rounded intelligent adolescents by instituting a core curriculum revolved around things like literature, science, and mathematics, but this only means that students have no choice in what they learn or how they learn it. “We are told to value our education, but I don’t care about the material I’m learning,” said Lindsey Ginsburg ‘18. “It’s hard to stay focused constantly on something you don’t care about.”

Furthermore, the way American schools teach is unnecessarily rigorous and draining. This consists of hours of homework a night and constant tests and quizzes. Are these effective teaching strategies? “I don’t think so,” reported Violet O’Neill ‘17. “I genuinely believe I would put so much more effort forward in each and every class if I didn’t have to go home and continue doing hours of the same mundane work.”

But there are many alternatives to this style of education. Schools in Finland for example assign little to no homework until students are teenagers, and even then the workload is light. Classes are smaller, there is minimal standardized testing, and there are no concrete grade levels. A school system like this may seem radical or inefficient to many Americans, but numbers say otherwise. Their graduation rate is 93% compared to America’s 75%, not to mention that their test scores outshine those of other countries.

Needless to say, America would greatly benefit from taking a page out Finland’s book or simply allowing for a less rigid learning environment. It is so crucial to provide young students a space where they can grow, learn, and express themselves in creative ways.