As you finish up the third essay for the night, you look up and squint at the clock that reads 2:00 a.m. You sigh and move on to the ten pages of math homework that wait in your folder. The next morning, you join numerous red eyed, tussle haired, slumped students as they walk past each other in the hallways, as another school day begins.

The past full night that was spent working on homework, projects and studying, wasn’t the first for anyone.

As the end of the quarter approaches, teachers are not cutting any slack as they ambush their students with more and more work. The average student has to get through a day of grueling class work, tests and quizzes, then get through sports practice, to finally face the deadliest obstacle: their loaded backpack of homework.

Many hardworking students work on homework for more than six hours a night. Add that to any after school activity, part time job, and the usual routine of daily life and students are getting about two to three hours of sleep. Even though it scientifically proven that teenagers need nine or more hours of sleep, teachers tend to ignore this and still expect their students to miraculously manage to keep up with their assignments.

“I think its crazy. Personally, I don’t get enough sleep some nights,” complained sophomore Rediet Berehe.

Many teachers try to cram as much as they can during the last two weeks of the quarter, but some wonder if it is really helpful. Is handing out worksheets after worksheets and more projects really helpful to the students?

“Either teachers need to become more efficient in helping us learn the lesson, giving less work, or other than that students need to put more effort into their work,” said sophomore Rajasak Leo.

“I think it’s not fair. They should have it more spread out,” said sophomore Danyal Barbar.

The lack of sleep often leads to a lack of food due to time constraints, results in tired and stressed teenagers who cannot concentrate while in school and then end up having angry teachers with students zoned out during class. A common complaint is that because of the homework load, students do not have time to study for the tests and quizzes during the day.

“If it’s a project, I do my best on it, so it tends to help my grade, but the tests and quizzes are difficult to pass because my time is taken up by all the papers and projects I have to do,” said Berehe.

The end of the semester is clearly pushing students, and teachers to their limits.