A struggle for most high schoolers is the lack of sleep; with the hours of homework, sports, clubs, after-school activities, and jobs, it hard enough to have time to eat let alone getting a full eight hours of shuteye.

The recommended amount of sleep for teenagers is around seven and half hours to nine hours according to the Nation-Wide Children’s Hospital, seeing how many schools start before 7:30 in the morning this doesn’t seem possible for many people. Many teenagers lack the hours that they need so their body and brain can continue to develop. 

Most high school students feel that they don’t have enough time to do all things they need to do in a day and get amount of sleep that they need.  Certain sports and activities leave students getting home late after dinner with students still needing to complete homework. Some students choose homework over sleep which creates a horrible cycle of lack of sleep.  

When a continued cycle of lack of sleep continues in adolescences it starts to hurt the development of the body and the brain, not to mention continued lack of sleep over time has serious health effects. The impact can be depression or anxiety. It can also affect your performance in school due to not being full cognitive ability in the brain due to drowsiness. 

Another effect of lack of sleep is dangerous driving behavior in teens because of the lack of sleep they are not completely aware.  Symptoms can be fast driving, distracted driving, and even falling asleep at the wheel. 

In today’s world high school students are participating more activities, taking harder classes, and dedicating more time to school. This means there is less time dedicated to sleep. Teenagers need to sleep more often so their brain can develop and there can be serious health issues if there is a continued lack of sleep.