how much homework do you get in secondary school

How Much Homework Is Too Much for Our Teens?

Here's what educators and parents can do to help kids find the right balance between school and home.

Does Your Teen Have Too Much Homework?

Today’s teens are under a lot of pressure.

They're under pressure to succeed, to win, to be the best and to get into the top colleges. With so much pressure, is it any wonder today’s youth report being under as much stress as their parents? In fact, during the school year, teens say they experience stress levels higher than those reported by adults, according to a previous American Psychological Association "Stress in America" survey.

Odds are if you ask a teen what's got them so worked up, the subject of school will come up. School can cause a lot of stress, which can lead to other serious problems, like sleep deprivation . According to the National Sleep Foundation, teens need between eight and 10 hours of sleep each night, but only 15 percent are even getting close to that amount. During the school week, most teens only get about six hours of zzz’s a night, and some of that sleep deficit may be attributed to homework.

When it comes to school, many adults would rather not trade places with a teen. Think about it. They get up at the crack of dawn and get on the bus when it’s pitch dark outside. They put in a full day sitting in hours of classes (sometimes four to seven different classes daily), only to get more work dumped on them to do at home. To top it off, many kids have after-school obligations, such as extracurricular activities including clubs and sports , and some have to work. After a long day, they finally get home to do even more work – schoolwork.

[Read: What Parents Should Know About Teen Depression .]

Homework is not only a source of stress for students, but it can also be a hassle for parents. If you are the parent of a kid who strives to be “perfect," then you know all too well how much time your child spends making sure every bit of homework is complete, even if it means pulling an all-nighter. On the flip side, if you’re the parent of a child who decided that school ends when the last bell rings, then you know how exhausting that homework tug-of-war can be. And heaven forbid if you’re that parent who is at their wit's end because your child excels on tests and quizzes but fails to turn in assignments. The woes of academics can go well beyond the confines of the school building and right into the home.

This is the time of year when many students and parents feel the burden of the academic load. Following spring break, many schools across the nation head into the final stretch of the year. As a result, some teachers increase the amount of homework they give. The assignments aren’t punishment, although to students and parents who are having to constantly stay on top of their kids' schoolwork, they can sure seem that way.

From a teacher’s perspective, the assignments are meant to help students better understand the course content and prepare for upcoming exams. Some schools have state-mandated end of grade or final tests. In those states these tests can account for 20 percent of a student’s final grade. So teachers want to make sure that they cover the entire curriculum before that exam. Aside from state-mandated tests, some high school students are enrolled in advanced placement or international baccalaureate college-level courses that have final tests given a month or more before the end of the term. In order to cover all of the content, teachers must maintain an accelerated pace. All of this means more out of class assignments.

Given the challenges kids face, there are a few questions parents and educators should consider:

Is homework necessary?

Many teens may give a quick "no" to this question, but the verdict is still out. Research supports both sides of the argument. Personally, I would say, yes, some homework is necessary, but it must be purposeful. If it’s busy work, then it’s a waste of time. Homework should be a supplemental teaching tool. Too often, some youth go home completely lost as they haven’t grasped concepts covered in class and they may become frustrated and overwhelmed.

For a parent who has been in this situation, you know how frustrating this can be, especially if it’s a subject that you haven’t encountered in a while. Homework can serve a purpose such as improving grades, increasing test scores and instilling a good work ethic. Purposeful homework can come in the form of individualizing assignments based on students’ needs or helping students practice newly acquired skills.

Homework should not be used to extend class time to cover more material. If your child is constantly coming home having to learn the material before doing the assignments, then it’s time to contact the teacher and set up a conference. Listen when kids express their concerns (like if they say they're expected to know concepts not taught in class) as they will provide clues about what’s happening or not happening in the classroom. Plus, getting to the root of the problem can help with keeping the peace at home too, as an irritable and grumpy teen can disrupt harmonious family dynamics .

[Read: What Makes Teens 'Most Likely to Succeed?' ]

How much is too much?

According to the National PTA and the National Education Association, students should only be doing about 10 minutes of homework per night per grade level. But teens are doing a lot more than that, according to a poll of high school students by the organization Statistic Brain . In that poll teens reported spending, on average, more than three hours on homework each school night, with 11th graders spending more time on homework than any other grade level. By contrast, some polls have shown that U.S. high school students report doing about seven hours of homework per week.

Much of a student's workload boils down to the courses they take (such as advanced or college prep classes), the teaching philosophy of educators and the student’s commitment to doing the work. Regardless, research has shown that doing more than two hours of homework per night does not benefit high school students. Having lots of homework to do every day makes it difficult for teens to have any downtime , let alone family time .

How do we respond to students' needs?

As an educator and parent, I can honestly say that oftentimes there is a mismatch in what teachers perceive as only taking 15 minutes and what really takes 45 minutes to complete. If you too find this to be the case, then reach out to your child's teacher and find out why the assignments are taking longer than anticipated for your child to complete.

Also, ask the teacher about whether faculty communicate regularly with one another about large upcoming assignments. Whether it’s setting up a shared school-wide assignment calendar or collaborating across curriculums during faculty meetings, educators need to discuss upcoming tests and projects, so students don’t end up with lots of assignments all competing for their attention and time at once. Inevitably, a student is going to get slammed occasionally, but if they have good rapport with their teachers, they will feel comfortable enough to reach out and see if alternative options are available. And as a parent, you can encourage your kid to have that dialogue with the teacher.

Often teens would rather blend into the class than stand out. That’s unfortunate because research has shown time and time again that positive teacher-student relationships are strong predictors of student engagement and achievement. By and large, most teachers appreciate students advocating for themselves and will go the extra mile to help them out.

Can there be a balance between home and school?

Students can strike a balance between school and home, but parents will have to help them find it. They need your guidance to learn how to better manage their time, get organized and prioritize tasks, which are all important life skills. Equally important is developing good study habits. Some students may need tutoring or coaching to help them learn new material or how to take notes and study. Also, don’t forget the importance of parent-teacher communication. Most educators want nothing more than for their students to succeed in their courses.

Learning should be fun, not mundane and cumbersome. Homework should only be given if its purposeful and in moderation. Equally important to homework is engaging in activities, socializing with friends and spending time with the family.

[See: 10 Concerns Parents Have About Their Kids' Health .]

Most adults don’t work a full-time job and then go home and do three more hours of work, and neither should your child. It's not easy learning to balance everything, especially if you're a teen. If your child is spending several hours on homework each night, don't hesitate to reach out to teachers and, if need be, school officials. Collectively, we can all work together to help our children de-stress and find the right balance between school and home.

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What’s the Right Amount of Homework?

Decades of research show that homework has some benefits, especially for students in middle and high school—but there are risks to assigning too much.

Many teachers and parents believe that homework helps students build study skills and review concepts learned in class. Others see homework as disruptive and unnecessary, leading to burnout and turning kids off to school. Decades of research show that the issue is more nuanced and complex than most people think: Homework is beneficial, but only to a degree. Students in high school gain the most, while younger kids benefit much less.

The National PTA and the National Education Association support the “ 10-minute homework guideline ”—a nightly 10 minutes of homework per grade level. But many teachers and parents are quick to point out that what matters is the quality of the homework assigned and how well it meets students’ needs, not the amount of time spent on it.

The guideline doesn’t account for students who may need to spend more—or less—time on assignments. In class, teachers can make adjustments to support struggling students, but at home, an assignment that takes one student 30 minutes to complete may take another twice as much time—often for reasons beyond their control. And homework can widen the achievement gap, putting students from low-income households and students with learning disabilities at a disadvantage.

However, the 10-minute guideline is useful in setting a limit: When kids spend too much time on homework, there are real consequences to consider.

Small Benefits for Elementary Students

As young children begin school, the focus should be on cultivating a love of learning, and assigning too much homework can undermine that goal. And young students often don’t have the study skills to benefit fully from homework, so it may be a poor use of time (Cooper, 1989 ; Cooper et al., 2006 ; Marzano & Pickering, 2007 ). A more effective activity may be nightly reading, especially if parents are involved. The benefits of reading are clear: If students aren’t proficient readers by the end of third grade, they’re less likely to succeed academically and graduate from high school (Fiester, 2013 ).

For second-grade teacher Jacqueline Fiorentino, the minor benefits of homework did not outweigh the potential drawback of turning young children against school at an early age, so she experimented with dropping mandatory homework. “Something surprising happened: They started doing more work at home,” Fiorentino writes . “This inspiring group of 8-year-olds used their newfound free time to explore subjects and topics of interest to them.” She encouraged her students to read at home and offered optional homework to extend classroom lessons and help them review material.

Moderate Benefits for Middle School Students

As students mature and develop the study skills necessary to delve deeply into a topic—and to retain what they learn—they also benefit more from homework. Nightly assignments can help prepare them for scholarly work, and research shows that homework can have moderate benefits for middle school students (Cooper et al., 2006 ). Recent research also shows that online math homework, which can be designed to adapt to students’ levels of understanding, can significantly boost test scores (Roschelle et al., 2016 ).

There are risks to assigning too much, however: A 2015 study found that when middle school students were assigned more than 90 to 100 minutes of daily homework, their math and science test scores began to decline (Fernández-Alonso, Suárez-Álvarez, & Muñiz, 2015 ). Crossing that upper limit can drain student motivation and focus. The researchers recommend that “homework should present a certain level of challenge or difficulty, without being so challenging that it discourages effort.” Teachers should avoid low-effort, repetitive assignments, and assign homework “with the aim of instilling work habits and promoting autonomous, self-directed learning.”

In other words, it’s the quality of homework that matters, not the quantity. Brian Sztabnik, a veteran middle and high school English teacher, suggests that teachers take a step back and ask themselves these five questions :

• How long will it take to complete?
• Have all learners been considered?
• Will an assignment encourage future success?
• Will an assignment place material in a context the classroom cannot?
• Does an assignment offer support when a teacher is not there?

More Benefits for High School Students, but Risks as Well

By the time they reach high school, students should be well on their way to becoming independent learners, so homework does provide a boost to learning at this age, as long as it isn’t overwhelming (Cooper et al., 2006 ; Marzano & Pickering, 2007 ). When students spend too much time on homework—more than two hours each night—it takes up valuable time to rest and spend time with family and friends. A 2013 study found that high school students can experience serious mental and physical health problems, from higher stress levels to sleep deprivation, when assigned too much homework (Galloway, Conner, & Pope, 2013 ).

Homework in high school should always relate to the lesson and be doable without any assistance, and feedback should be clear and explicit.

Teachers should also keep in mind that not all students have equal opportunities to finish their homework at home, so incomplete homework may not be a true reflection of their learning—it may be more a result of issues they face outside of school. They may be hindered by issues such as lack of a quiet space at home, resources such as a computer or broadband connectivity, or parental support (OECD, 2014 ). In such cases, giving low homework scores may be unfair.

Since the quantities of time discussed here are totals, teachers in middle and high school should be aware of how much homework other teachers are assigning. It may seem reasonable to assign 30 minutes of daily homework, but across six subjects, that’s three hours—far above a reasonable amount even for a high school senior. Psychologist Maurice Elias sees this as a common mistake: Individual teachers create homework policies that in aggregate can overwhelm students. He suggests that teachers work together to develop a school-wide homework policy and make it a key topic of back-to-school night and the first parent-teacher conferences of the school year.

Parents Play a Key Role

Homework can be a powerful tool to help parents become more involved in their child’s learning (Walker et al., 2004 ). It can provide insights into a child’s strengths and interests, and can also encourage conversations about a child’s life at school. If a parent has positive attitudes toward homework, their children are more likely to share those same values, promoting academic success.

But it’s also possible for parents to be overbearing, putting too much emphasis on test scores or grades, which can be disruptive for children (Madjar, Shklar, & Moshe, 2015 ). Parents should avoid being overly intrusive or controlling—students report feeling less motivated to learn when they don’t have enough space and autonomy to do their homework (Orkin, May, & Wolf, 2017 ; Patall, Cooper, & Robinson, 2008 ; Silinskas & Kikas, 2017 ). So while homework can encourage parents to be more involved with their kids, it’s important to not make it a source of conflict.

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The National Education Association and the National Parent Teacher Association have suggested that a healthy number of hours that students should be spending can be determined by the “10-minute rule.” This means that each grade level should have a maximum homework time incrementing by 10 minutes depending on their grade level (for instance, ninth-graders would have 90 minutes of homework, 10th-graders should have 100 minutes, and so on).

As ‘finals week’ rapidly approaches, students not only devote effort to attaining their desired exam scores but make a last attempt to keep or change the grade they have for semester one by making up homework assignments.

High schoolers reported doing an average of 2.7 hours of homework per weeknight, according to a study by the Washington Post from 2018 to 2020 of over 50,000 individuals. A survey of approximately 200 Bellaire High School students revealed that some students spend over three times this number.

The demographics of this survey included 34 freshmen, 43 sophomores, 54 juniors and 54 seniors on average.

When asked how many hours students spent on homework in a day on average, answers ranged from zero to more than nine with an average of about four hours. In contrast, polled students said that about one hour of homework would constitute a healthy number of hours.

Junior Claire Zhang said she feels academically pressured in her AP schedule, but not necessarily by the classes.

“The class environment in AP classes can feel pressuring because everyone is always working hard and it makes it difficult to keep up sometimes.” Zhang said.

A total of 93 students reported that the minimum grade they would be satisfied with receiving in a class would be an A. This was followed by 81 students, who responded that a B would be the minimum acceptable grade. 19 students responded with a C and four responded with a D.

“I am happy with the classes I take, but sometimes it can be very stressful to try to keep up,” freshman Allyson Nguyen said. “I feel academically pressured to keep an A in my classes.”

Up to 152 students said that grades are extremely important to them, while 32 said they generally are more apathetic about their academic performance.

Last year, nine valedictorians graduated from Bellaire. They each achieved a grade point average of 5.0. HISD has never seen this amount of valedictorians in one school, and as of now there are 14 valedictorians.

“I feel that it does degrade the title of valedictorian because as long as a student knows how to plan their schedule accordingly and make good grades in the classes, then anyone can be valedictorian,” Zhang said.

Bellaire offers classes like physical education and health in the summer. These summer classes allow students to skip the 4.0 class and not put it on their transcript. Some electives also have a 5.0 grade point average like debate.

Close to 200 students were polled about Bellaire having multiple valedictorians. They primarily answered that they were in favor of Bellaire having multiple valedictorians, which has recently attracted significant acclaim .

Senior Katherine Chen is one of the 14 valedictorians graduating this year and said that she views the class of 2022 as having an extraordinary amount of extremely hardworking individuals.

“I think it was expected since freshman year since most of us knew about the others and were just focused on doing our personal best,” Chen said.

Chen said that each valedictorian achieved the honor on their own and deserves it.

“I’m honestly very happy for the other valedictorians and happy that Bellaire is such a good school,” Chen said. “I don’t feel any less special with 13 other valedictorians.”

Nguyen said that having multiple valedictorians shows just how competitive the school is.

“It’s impressive, yet scary to think about competing against my classmates,” Nguyen said.

Offering 30 AP classes and boasting a significant number of merit-based scholars Bellaire can be considered a competitive school.

“I feel academically challenged but not pressured,” Chen said. “Every class I take helps push me beyond my comfort zone but is not too much to handle.”

Students have the opportunity to have off-periods if they’ve met all their credits and are able to maintain a high level of academic performance. But for freshmen like Nguyen, off periods are considered a privilege. Nguyen said she usually has an hour to five hours worth of work everyday.

“Depending on the day, there can be a lot of work, especially with extra curriculars,” Nguyen said. “Although, I am a freshman, so I feel like it’s not as bad in comparison to higher grades.”

According to the survey of Bellaire students, when asked to evaluate their agreement with the statement “students who get better grades tend to be smarter overall than students who get worse grades,” responders largely disagreed.

Zhang said that for students on the cusp of applying to college, it can sometimes be hard to ignore the mental pressure to attain good grades.

“As a junior, it’s really easy to get extremely anxious about your GPA,” Zhang said. “It’s also a very common but toxic practice to determine your self-worth through your grades but I think that we just need to remember that our mental health should also come first. Sometimes, it’s just not the right day for everyone and one test doesn’t determine our smartness.”

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Anonymous • Nov 21, 2023 at 10:32 am

It’s not really helping me understand how much.

josh • May 9, 2023 at 9:58 am

Kassie • May 6, 2022 at 12:29 pm

Im using this for an English report. This is great because on of my sources needed to be from another student. Homework drives me insane. Im glad this is very updated too!!

Kaylee Swaim • Jan 25, 2023 at 9:21 pm

I am also using this for an English report. I have to do an argumentative essay about banning homework in schools and this helps sooo much!

Izzy McAvaney • Mar 15, 2023 at 6:43 pm

I am ALSO using this for an English report on cutting down school days, homework drives me insane!!

E. Elliott • Apr 25, 2022 at 6:42 pm

I’m from Louisiana and am actually using this for an English Essay thanks for the information it was very informative.

Nabila Wilson • Jan 10, 2022 at 6:56 pm

Interesting with the polls! I didn’t realize about 14 valedictorians, that’s crazy.

Do our kids have too much homework?

by: Marian Wilde | Updated: January 31, 2024

Print article

Many students and their parents are frazzled by the amount of homework being piled on in the schools. Yet many researchers say that American students have just the right amount of homework.

“Kids today are overwhelmed!” a parent recently wrote in an email to GreatSchools.org “My first-grade son was required to research a significant person from history and write a paper of at least two pages about the person, with a bibliography. How can he be expected to do that by himself? He just started to learn to read and write a couple of months ago. Schools are pushing too hard and expecting too much from kids.”

Diane Garfield, a fifth grade teacher in San Francisco, concurs. “I believe that we’re stressing children out,” she says.

But hold on, it’s not just the kids who are stressed out . “Teachers nowadays assign these almost college-level projects with requirements that make my mouth fall open with disbelief,” says another frustrated parent. “It’s not just the kids who suffer!”

“How many people take home an average of two hours or more of work that must be completed for the next day?” asks Tonya Noonan Herring, a New Mexico mother of three, an attorney and a former high school English teacher. “Most of us, even attorneys, do not do this. Bottom line: students have too much homework and most of it is not productive or necessary.”

Research about homework

How do educational researchers weigh in on the issue? According to Brian Gill, a senior social scientist at the Rand Corporation, there is no evidence that kids are doing more homework than they did before.

“If you look at high school kids in the late ’90s, they’re not doing substantially more homework than kids did in the ’80s, ’70s, ’60s or the ’40s,” he says. “In fact, the trends through most of this time period are pretty flat. And most high school students in this country don’t do a lot of homework. The median appears to be about four hours a week.”

Education researchers like Gill base their conclusions, in part, on data gathered by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests.

“It doesn’t suggest that most kids are doing a tremendous amount,” says Gill. “That’s not to say there aren’t any kids with too much homework. There surely are some. There’s enormous variation across communities. But it’s not a crisis in that it’s a very small proportion of kids who are spending an enormous amount of time on homework.”

Etta Kralovec, author of The End of Homework: How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, and Limits Learning , disagrees, saying NAEP data is not a reliable source of information. “Students take the NAEP test and one of the questions they have to fill out is, ‘How much homework did you do last night’ Anybody who knows schools knows that teachers by and large do not give homework the night before a national assessment. It just doesn’t happen. Teachers are very clear with kids that they need to get a good night’s sleep and they need to eat well to prepare for a test.

“So asking a kid how much homework they did the night before a national test and claiming that that data tells us anything about the general run of the mill experience of kids and homework over the school year is, I think, really dishonest.”

Further muddying the waters is an AP/AOL poll that suggests that most Americans feel that their children are getting the right amount of homework. It found that 57% of parents felt that their child was assigned about the right amount of homework, 23% thought there was too little and 19% thought there was too much.

One indisputable fact

One homework fact that educators do agree upon is that the young child today is doing more homework than ever before.

“Parents are correct in saying that they didn’t get homework in the early grades and that their kids do,” says Harris Cooper, professor of psychology and director of the education program at Duke University.

Gill quantifies the change this way: “There has been some increase in homework for the kids in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade. But it’s been an increase from zero to 20 minutes a day. So that is something that’s fairly new in the last quarter century.”

The history of homework

In his research, Gill found that homework has always been controversial. “Around the turn of the 20th century, the Ladies’ Home Journal carried on a crusade against homework. They thought that kids were better off spending their time outside playing and looking at clouds. The most spectacular success this movement had was in the state of California, where in 1901 the legislature passed a law abolishing homework in grades K-8. That lasted about 15 years and then was quietly repealed. Then there was a lot of activism against homework again in the 1930s.”

The proponents of homework have remained consistent in their reasons for why homework is a beneficial practice, says Gill. “One, it extends the work in the classroom with additional time on task. Second, it develops habits of independent study. Third, it’s a form of communication between the school and the parents. It gives parents an idea of what their kids are doing in school.”

The anti-homework crowd has also been consistent in their reasons for wanting to abolish or reduce homework.

“The first one is children’s health,” says Gill. “A hundred years ago, you had medical doctors testifying that heavy loads of books were causing children’s spines to be bent.”

The more things change, the more they stay the same, it seems. There were also concerns about excessive amounts of stress .

“Although they didn’t use the term ‘stress,'” says Gill. “They worried about ‘nervous breakdowns.'”

“In the 1930s, there were lots of graduate students in education schools around the country who were doing experiments that claimed to show that homework had no academic value — that kids who got homework didn’t learn any more than kids who didn’t,” Gill continues. Also, a lot of the opposition to homework, in the first half of the 20th century, was motivated by a notion that it was a leftover from a 19th-century model of schooling, which was based on recitation, memorization and drill. Progressive educators were trying to replace that with something more creative, something more interesting to kids.”

The more-is-better movement

Garfield, the San Francisco fifth-grade teacher, says that when she started teaching 30 years ago, she didn’t give any homework. “Then parents started asking for it,” she says. “I got In junior high and high school there’s so much homework, they need to get prepared.” So I bought that one. I said, ‘OK, they need to be prepared.’ But they don’t need two hours.”

Cooper sees the trend toward more homework as symptomatic of high-achieving parents who want the best for their children. “Part of it, I think, is pressure from the parents with regard to their desire to have their kids be competitive for the best universities in the country. The communities in which homework is being piled on are generally affluent communities.”

The less-is-better campaign

Alfie Kohn, a widely-admired progressive writer on education and parenting, published a sharp rebuttal to the more-homework-is-better argument in his 2006 book The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing . Kohn criticized the pro-homework studies that Cooper referenced as “inconclusive… they only show an association, not a causal relationship” and he titled his first chapter “Missing Out on Their Childhoods.”

Vera Goodman’s 2020 book, Simply Too Much Homework: What Can We Do? , repeats Kohn’s scrutiny and urges parents to appeal to school and government leaders to revise homework policies. Goodman believes today’s homework load stresses out teachers, parents, and students, deprives children of unstructured time for play, hobbies, and individual pursuits, and inhibits the joy of learning.

Homework guidelines

What’s a parent to do, you ask? Fortunately, there are some sanity-saving homework guidelines.

Cooper points to “The 10-Minute Rule” formulated by the National PTA and the National Education Association, which suggests that kids should be doing about 10 minutes of homework per night per grade level. In other words, 10 minutes for first-graders, 20 for second-graders and so on.

Too much homework vs. the optimal amount

Cooper has found that the correlation between homework and achievement is generally supportive of these guidelines. “We found that for kids in elementary school there was hardly any relationship between how much homework young children did and how well they were doing in school, but in middle school the relationship is positive and increases until the kids were doing between an hour to two hours a night, which is right where the 10-minute rule says it’s going to be optimal.

“After that it didn’t go up anymore. Kids that reported doing more than two hours of homework a night in middle school weren’t doing any better in school than kids who were doing between an hour to two hours.”

Garfield has a very clear homework policy that she distributes to her parents at the beginning of each school year. “I give one subject a night. It’s what we were studying in class or preparation for the next day. It should be done within half an hour at most. I believe that children have many outside activities now and they also need to live fully as children. To have them work for six hours a day at school and then go home and work for hours at night does not seem right. It doesn’t allow them to have a childhood.”

International comparisons

How do American kids fare when compared to students in other countries? Professors Gerald LeTendre and David Baker of Pennsylvania State University conclude in their 2005 book, National Differences, Global Similarities: World Culture and the Future of Schooling, that American middle schoolers do more homework than their peers in Japan, Korea, or Taiwan, but less than their peers in Singapore and Hong Kong.

One of the surprising findings of their research was that more homework does not correlate with higher test scores. LeTendre notes: “That really flummoxes people because they say, ‘Doesn’t doing more homework mean getting better scores?’ The answer quite simply is no.”

Homework is a complicated thing

To be effective, homework must be used in a certain way, he says. “Let me give you an example. Most homework in the fourth grade in the U.S. is worksheets. Fill them out, turn them in, maybe the teacher will check them, maybe not. That is a very ineffective use of homework. An effective use of homework would be the teacher sitting down and thinking ‘Elizabeth has trouble with number placement, so I’m going to give her seven problems on number placement.’ Then the next day the teacher sits down with Elizabeth and she says, ‘Was this hard for you? Where did you have difficulty?’ Then she gives Elizabeth either more or less material. As you can imagine, that kind of homework rarely happens.”

Shotgun homework

“What typically happens is people give what we call ‘shotgun homework’: blanket drills, questions and problems from the book. On a national level that’s associated with less well-functioning school systems,” he says. “In a sense, you could sort of think of it as a sign of weaker teachers or less well-prepared teachers. Over time, we see that in elementary and middle schools more and more homework is being given, and that countries around the world are doing this in an attempt to increase their test scores, and that is basically a failing strategy.”

Quality not quantity?

“ The Case for (Quality) Homework: Why It Improves Learning, and How Parents Can Help ,” a 2019 paper written by Boston University psychologist Janine Bempechat, asks for homework that specifically helps children “confront ever-more-complex tasks” that enable them to gain resilience and embrace challenges.

Similar research from University of Ovideo in Spain titled “ Homework: Facts and Fiction 2021 ” says evidence shows that how homework is applied is more important than how much is required, and it asserts that a moderate amount of homework yields the most academic achievement. The most important aspect of quality homework assignment? The effort required and the emotions prompted by the task.

Robyn Jackson, author of How to Plan Rigorous Instruction and other media about rigor says the key to quality homework is not the time spent, but the rigor — or mental challenge — involved. ( Read more about how to evaluate your child’s homework for rigor here .)

Nightly reading as a homework replacement

Across the country, many elementary schools have replaced homework with a nightly reading requirement. There are many benefits to children reading every night , either out loud with a parent or independently: it increases their vocabulary, imagination, concentration, memory, empathy, academic ability, knowledge of different cultures and perspectives. Plus, it reduces stress, helps kids sleep, and bonds children to their cuddling parents or guardians. Twenty to 30 minutes of reading each day is generally recommended.

But, is this always possible, or even ideal?

No, it’s not.

Alfie Kohn criticizes this added assignment in his blog post, “ How To Create Nonreaders .” He cites an example from a parent (Julie King) who reports, “Our children are now expected to read 20 minutes a night, and record such on their homework sheet. What parents are discovering (surprise) is that those kids who used to sit down and read for pleasure — the kids who would get lost in a book and have to be told to put it down to eat/play/whatever — are now setting the timer… and stopping when the timer dings. … Reading has become a chore, like brushing your teeth.”

The take-away from Kohn? Don’t undermine reading for pleasure by turning it into another task burdening your child’s tired brain.

Additional resources

Books Simply Too Much Homework: What Can We do? by Vera Goodman, Trafford Publishing, 2020

The Case Against Homework: How Homework is Hurting Children and What Parents Can Do About It by Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish, Crown Publishers, 2007

The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing by Alfie Kohn, Hatchett Books, 2006 The End of Homework: How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, and Limits Learning by Etta Kralovec and John Buell, Beacon Press, 2001.

The Battle Over Homework: Common Ground for Administrators, Teachers, and Parents by Harris M. Cooper, Corwin Press, 2001.

Seven Steps to Homework Success: A Family Guide to Solving Common Homework Problems by Sydney Zentall and Sam Goldstein, Specialty Press, 1998.

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Homework in High School: How Much Is Too Much?

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It’s not hard to find a high school student who is stressed about homework. Many are stressed to the max–juggling extracurricular activities, jobs, and family responsibilities. It can be hard for many students, particularly low-income students, to find the time to dedicate to homework. So students in the PBS NewsHour Student Reporting Labs program at YouthBeat in Oakland, California are asking what’s a fair amount of homework for high school students?

TEACHERS: Guide your students to practice civil discourse about current topics and get practice writing CER (claim, evidence, reasoning) responses.  Explore lesson supports.

Is homework beneficial to students?

The homework debate has been going on for years. There’s a big body of research that shows that homework can have a positive impact on academic performance. It can also help students prepare for the academic rigors of college.

Does homework hurt students?

Some research suggests that homework is only beneficial up to a certain point. Too much homework can lead to compromised health and greater stress in students. Many students, particularly low-income students, can struggle to find the time to do homework, especially if they are working jobs after school or taking care of family members. Some students might not have access to technology, like computers or the internet, that are needed to complete assignments at home– which can make completing assignments even more challenging. Many argue that this contributes to inequity in education– particularly if completing homework is linked to better academic performance.

How much homework should students get?

Based on research, the National Education Association recommends the 10-minute rule stating students should receive 10 minutes of homework per grade per night. But opponents to homework point out that for seniors that’s still 2 hours of homework which can be a lot for students with conflicting obligations. And in reality, high school students say it can be tough for teachers to coordinate their homework assignments since students are taking a variety of different classes. Some people advocate for eliminating homework altogether.

Edweek: How Much Homework Is Enough? Depends Who You Ask

Business Insider: Here’s How Homework Differs Around the World

Review of Educational Research: Does Homework Improve Academic Achievement? A Synthesis of Research, 1987-2003

Phys.org: Study suggests more than two hours of homework a night may be counterproductive

The Journal of Experimental Education: Nonacademic Effects of Homework in Privileged, High-Performing High Schools

National Education Association: Research Spotlight on Homework NEA Reviews of the Research on Best Practices in Education

The Atlantic: Who Does Homework Work For?

Center for Public Education: What research says about the value of homework: Research review

Time: Opinion: Why I think All Schools Should Abolish Homework

The Atlantic: A Teacher’s Defense of Homework

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Should Kids Get Homework?

Homework gives elementary students a way to practice concepts, but too much can be harmful, experts say.

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Effective homework reinforces math, reading, writing or spelling skills, but in a way that's meaningful.

How much homework students should get has long been a source of debate among parents and educators. In recent years, some districts have even implemented no-homework policies, as students juggle sports, music and other activities after school.

Parents of elementary school students, in particular, have argued that after-school hours should be spent with family or playing outside rather than completing assignments. And there is little research to show that homework improves academic achievement for elementary students.

But some experts say there's value in homework, even for younger students. When done well, it can help students practice core concepts and develop study habits and time management skills. The key to effective homework, they say, is keeping assignments related to classroom learning, and tailoring the amount by age: Many experts suggest no homework for kindergartners, and little to none in first and second grade.

Value of Homework

Homework provides a chance to solidify what is being taught in the classroom that day, week or unit. Practice matters, says Janine Bempechat, clinical professor at Boston University 's Wheelock College of Education & Human Development.

"There really is no other domain of human ability where anybody would say you don't need to practice," she adds. "We have children practicing piano and we have children going to sports practice several days a week after school. You name the domain of ability and practice is in there."

Homework is also the place where schools and families most frequently intersect.

"The children are bringing things from the school into the home," says Paula S. Fass, professor emerita of history at the University of California—Berkeley and the author of "The End of American Childhood." "Before the pandemic, (homework) was the only real sense that parents had to what was going on in schools."

Harris Cooper, professor emeritus of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University and author of "The Battle Over Homework," examined more than 60 research studies on homework between 1987 and 2003 and found that — when designed properly — homework can lead to greater student success. Too much, however, is harmful. And homework has a greater positive effect on students in secondary school (grades 7-12) than those in elementary.

"Every child should be doing homework, but the amount and type that they're doing should be appropriate for their developmental level," he says. "For teachers, it's a balancing act. Doing away with homework completely is not in the best interest of children and families. But overburdening families with homework is also not in the child's or a family's best interest."

Negative Homework Assignments

Not all homework for elementary students involves completing a worksheet. Assignments can be fun, says Cooper, like having students visit educational locations, keep statistics on their favorite sports teams, read for pleasure or even help their parents grocery shop. The point is to show students that activities done outside of school can relate to subjects learned in the classroom.

But assignments that are just busy work, that force students to learn new concepts at home, or that are overly time-consuming can be counterproductive, experts say.

Homework that's just busy work.

Effective homework reinforces math, reading, writing or spelling skills, but in a way that's meaningful, experts say. Assignments that look more like busy work – projects or worksheets that don't require teacher feedback and aren't related to topics learned in the classroom – can be frustrating for students and create burdens for families.

"The mental health piece has definitely played a role here over the last couple of years during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the last thing we want to do is frustrate students with busy work or homework that makes no sense," says Dave Steckler, principal of Red Trail Elementary School in Mandan, North Dakota.

Homework on material that kids haven't learned yet.

With the pressure to cover all topics on standardized tests and limited time during the school day, some teachers assign homework that has not yet been taught in the classroom.

Not only does this create stress, but it also causes equity challenges. Some parents speak languages other than English or work several jobs, and they aren't able to help teach their children new concepts.

" It just becomes agony for both parents and the kids to get through this worksheet, and the goal becomes getting to the bottom of (the) worksheet with answers filled in without any understanding of what any of it matters for," says professor Susan R. Goldman, co-director of the Learning Sciences Research Institute at the University of Illinois—Chicago .

Homework that's overly time-consuming.

The standard homework guideline recommended by the National Parent Teacher Association and the National Education Association is the "10-minute rule" – 10 minutes of nightly homework per grade level. A fourth grader, for instance, would receive a total of 40 minutes of homework per night.

But this does not always happen, especially since not every student learns the same. A 2015 study published in the American Journal of Family Therapy found that primary school children actually received three times the recommended amount of homework — and that family stress increased along with the homework load.

Young children can only remain attentive for short periods, so large amounts of homework, especially lengthy projects, can negatively affect students' views on school. Some individual long-term projects – like having to build a replica city, for example – typically become an assignment for parents rather than students, Fass says.

"It's one thing to assign a project like that in which several kids are working on it together," she adds. "In (that) case, the kids do normally work on it. It's another to send it home to the families, where it becomes a burden and doesn't really accomplish very much."

Private vs. Public Schools

Do private schools assign more homework than public schools? There's little research on the issue, but experts say private school parents may be more accepting of homework, seeing it as a sign of academic rigor.

Of course, not all private schools are the same – some focus on college preparation and traditional academics, while others stress alternative approaches to education.

"I think in the academically oriented private schools, there's more support for homework from parents," says Gerald K. LeTendre, chair of educational administration at Pennsylvania State University—University Park . "I don't know if there's any research to show there's more homework, but it's less of a contentious issue."

How to Address Homework Overload

First, assess if the workload takes as long as it appears. Sometimes children may start working on a homework assignment, wander away and come back later, Cooper says.

"Parents don't see it, but they know that their child has started doing their homework four hours ago and still not done it," he adds. "They don't see that there are those four hours where their child was doing lots of other things. So the homework assignment itself actually is not four hours long. It's the way the child is approaching it."

But if homework is becoming stressful or workload is excessive, experts suggest parents first approach the teacher, followed by a school administrator.

"Many times, we can solve a lot of issues by having conversations," Steckler says, including by "sitting down, talking about the amount of homework, and what's appropriate and not appropriate."

Study Tips for High School Students

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Trauma-informed practices in schools, teacher well-being, cultivating diversity, equity, & inclusion, integrating technology in the classroom, social-emotional development, covid-19 resources, invest in resilience: summer toolkit, civics & resilience, all toolkits, degree programs, trauma-informed professional development, teacher licensure & certification, how to become - career information, classroom management, instructional design, lifestyle & self-care, online higher ed teaching, current events, homework helps high school students most — but it must be purposeful.

Researchers make a strong case for the value of homework for high school students.

During the high school years, many students participate in extracurricular activities or take on part-time jobs — responsibilities that leave little time for families to connect, which remains important for this age group. Advocates for less-intense homework policies maintain that students should be able to balance school, activities and family life.

Homework helps high school students — but how much do they need?

High school students are better able to manage their time, stay focused and complete complex tasks, which enables them to tap the value of homework. In high school, the 10-minute per grade level rule still applies (students should receive 10 minutes of homework per night based on the grade level they are in). This rule allows up to 120 minutes of homework in the evening for upper-level students. While students occasionally need to do more than two hours of work a night, this should be the exception rather than the rule. Research shows that completing more than this amount of homework results in no further gains.

There is, however, a larger spread in the amount of homework students do each night, even among those at the same grade level. As students get further along in high school, they can select the rigor of their curriculum. Those who pursue higher-level work, such as AP, honors or college-level courses, will do more homework each night than those who have a less-rigorous course load. Still, students shouldn’t be assigned more than two hours of homework a night on average.

High school students need real work, not busy work

Researchers agree that homework should serve a specific developmental or educational purpose. High school students should not get the impression their homework is just busy work; that increases resentment and reduces the likelihood they’ll see homework as crucial to their education.

The goal of homework, especially in the high school years, is for students to spend more time studying a subject and engaging in the curriculum — assuming the homework is designed to be meaningful and engaging rather than passive activities that don’t truly engage or promote understanding of new concepts. Purposeful homework should give students a deeper understanding of content and allow them to practice skills that they can master independently.

While some researchers suggest reducing homework for high school students, most researchers agree that homework at this age level is important because it has been positively linked to academic achievement. Yet it’s important to remember that the amount and type of homework matters, and teachers should strive to give less homework when possible so long as it promotes academic excellence.

Caitrin Blake has a BA in English and Sociology from the University of Vermont and a master’s degree in English literature from the University of Colorado Denver. She teaches composition at Arapahoe Community College.

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Striking a Balance: How Much Homework is Too Much Homework for High Schoolers?

It might surprise you to learn that today’s students feel under more pressure than ever before. Despite the endless resources, the expectations on students can be tiresome. Between online schooling, the cost of living, the rising cost of university life, and the progressively more common hybrid teaching model, students feel immense pressure to succeed. This makes educators worldwide wonder how much homework I should give my students.

This question is especially relevant for high school educators who are trying to prepare their students for college or the workforce and all-important standardized tests that could define their futures for them (as well as the funding for your school).

Giving a certain amount of homework seems necessary in order for students to truly understand and apply the material they are learning. Of course, teachers also might not have enough time to get through all the necessary work during class.

According to research on the effects of homework , over two hours of homework a night can harm students’ stress levels and create a lack of balance in their lives. Things like assigning homework as busy work or asking students to learn more material at home that wasn’t covered in class could end up in hours of homework a night that are highly detrimental to students’ development and overall happiness.

However, educators will find no perfect answer to this question, so the best approach is to find a happy medium. Regarding homework assignments, strive to balance challenging students and simply helping them learn the material. To find that happy medium, consider the following:

Define the purpose of homework.

As an educator, you will find that defining the purpose of the homework you’re assigning will tell you how necessary it is or how much you should give.

If the purpose is to help students apply a new concept, demonstrate their understanding, or build an important skill, then assign it away. 

However, you might be overdoing it if you find yourself assigning work to keep students busy, teaching new material not covered in class, or making sure they understand the value of hard work. 

Take high school schedules into consideration.

High school students already have nearly impossible schedules to maintain, especially in an increasingly modern and digital world.

Most students are trying to fit in after-school activities, college prep, essay writing, sports, and time with family and friends into their lives. 

Try and picture this level of logistics from a young high schooler’s mindset, a mindset that is still developing. They are dealing with the constant struggle inherent in growing up while trying to retain high school freedoms.

Remember that teens need sleep.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention , teens between the ages of 13 and 18 need an average of 8-10 hours of sleep a night for healthy development, but most are not getting the amount of sleep they need on school nights.

Kids and teens who do not get enough sleep are at a higher risk of developing health and behavior problems, which could impair their ability to learn effectively.

So, sending teens home with too much homework might actually impair your ability to prepare them for the future or even for the next day’s class.

Reasons Not to Overwork High School Students

Rather than harping on the negative effects of too much homework, educators might be inspired to consider the positive effects of assigning less homework, if possible.

Create resilient learners, not perfectionists.

By focusing on learning from, working with, and even failing at classroom material, rather than immediately mastering it, educators will help to create resilient learners. 

So many high school students face pressure to be the best, to be exceptional, and to attend top colleges and universities. They also face pressure to have perfect social media accounts, to be the most popular students, and to define their identities flawlessly.

This idea of perfection, as we know, is impossible to achieve. So, if educators can strive to teach students to work hard for shorter amounts of time, rather than perfectly learning a concept in one night, students will be more resilient and accepting of failure in life.

Instill the lifelong importance of play and rest.

We all need a true, unwinding rest sometimes. As adults, we are constantly trying to find our sense of play again and searching for moments of rest. Many of us spend free time reading self-help books and listening to inspirational TED talks, knowing that we have lost some sense of ourselves by focusing only on work. 

American society especially encourages us to be forever busy, working as hard as we can until we reach our goals.

Though the hard work narrative is still important in many respects, let’s not deprive our high school students of their inherent sense of play and rest. 

Perhaps we can even cultivate an understanding of the importance of play and rest, building these concepts into educational homework plans before these students become another generation of overworked adults.

Avoid early academic burnout.

Finally, by avoiding too much homework than is necessary, educators will help students also avoid academic burnout too early. 

When high school students spend all of high school working as hard and as many hours, or more, than they will in college, the prospect of college work can be daunting. 

Students don’t need to feel burned out before reaching a college campus or starting their first post-graduate career. They have plenty of time to overwork themselves if they wish, but they should be able to enjoy learning in high school without becoming completely overwhelmed in the process.

By assigning less homework, it might feel like you’re missing out as an educator or falling behind; but really think about how much is too much. And try to give your high school students a break.

It is all about health 

When it comes down to it, the student comes first. That means their physical, mental, and emotional health, above all the other results educators might have been taught to strive for. Do not sacrifice the health of the student for the final class percentage on the final exam. If you are teaching an AP class or just a tough subject to a class full of Seniors, then homework is inevitable. But communication will win out every time. By at least explaining the amount of homework, you will find a better rapport with the students expected to complete the work. If you are curious about teaching strategies or want to learn more about how NSHSS works with  educators , visit our website for more information!

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High Schools Assign 3.5 Hours of Homework a Night, Survey Estimates

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Amidst the current backlash against homework, it would be helpful to get some real data on how much homework we’re actually talking about.

The college of education at the for-profit University of Phoenix recently took a stab at it, asking Harris Poll to survey teachers about the hours of homework they require and why they assign it. The pollsters talked to 1,005 teachers in public, private, and parochial schools across the United States, a group designed to be a representative sample of the nation’s 3.7 million teachers.

High school teachers interviewed said they assign an average of 3.5 hours worth of homework a week. For students who study five days a week, that’s 42 minutes a day per class, or 3.5 hours a day for a typical student taking five classes.

Middle school teachers (grades 6-8) assigned roughly the same amount: 3.2 hours of homework a week, or 38.4 minutes a day per class. That adds up to 3.2 hours of homework a night for a student with five classes. K-5 teachers said they assigned an average of 2.9 hours of homework each week.

The data reflect what anecdotally shocks many parents: homework loads jump in middle school.

Teachers’ top three reasons for assigning homework were to see how well students understand lessons, help students develop essential problem-solving skills, and show parents what’s being learned in school. Just 30 percent of teachers chose covering more content as one of their top reasons for assigning homework.

The survey also finds that the longer a teacher has been in the classroom, the less homework they assign, said Tanya Burden, a spokeswoman for the University of Phoenix.

Here’s a breakdown of weekly homework assigned, by years of experience:

• 3.6 hours (teachers with less than 10 years in the classroom)

• 3.1 hours (teachers with 10 to 19 years in the classroom)

• 2.8 hours (teachers with more than 20 years in the classroom)

Homework has come under fire from parents and administrators who worry that hours of after-school assignments are stressing students out . Education Week recently reported on research indicating that students with heavy loads of homework were significantly more likely to be sleep-deprived, particularly if the homework load had jumped between ages 12 and 15. Others question whether required assignments are necessary for learning .

But doth Americans protest too much? The Atlantic recently ran a group of photos showing children doing homework after natural disasters and war had displaced them. It’s a good reminder that in many places, homework is considered a privilege, not a burden.

CORRECTION (Feb. 28): The original version of this blog post included incorrect figures on the time for homework assigned each day per class for both high school teachers and middle school teachers.

A version of this news article first appeared in the Time and Learning blog.

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The parents' guide to secondary school: homework

If you thought getting your child to do their primary school homework was tough, just wait till they get to secondary school !

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Homework is a major – and daily – part of secondary school life, and while your child will be expected to get it done independently, it’s still important for you to keep abreast of what they need to do.

What’s the point of homework?

Homework helps to build on what your child is learning at school, and improves their academic achievement. A Department of Education study that followed 3,000 children over a 15-year period showed that any homework had educational benefits, and that pupils who did two to three hours a night got better results in English , maths and science .

Homework is particularly important when children start studying for GCSEs. Not only will they have to revise for their exams, but they’ll also need to put in the hours at home to make sure they’ve covered the syllabus in enough depth.

How much should your child be doing?

Previously, the Government advised that secondary school children should do two and a half hours of homework per night, but that guidance was scrapped in 2012, and it’s now up to schools to decide how much to set. About an hour to an hour and a half is usual in Years 7 and 8, rising to two to three hours in Years 10 and 11. A study of children’s homework habits around the world found that British pupils do an average 4.9 hours per week.

You can find out how much homework your child’s school expects them to do by looking at their homework policy on their website. There may also be a homework timetable to download so you can keep track of what your child should be doing.

What sort of tasks are set?

The type of homework your child is given will vary. It could include:

Learning: committing facts, words, details or rules to memory – for example, learning spellings or a list of irregular French verbs.

Completing: finishing work that was started at school.

Questions: answering questions about what they’ve been learning in class.

Researching: looking up information about a given topic using the internet, books and other resources.

Writing up: producing a final draft of rough work that was completed in school, or writing up what they’ve been learning about – for example, an essay about the book they’re reading in English.

Revision: going over what they’ve been learning in preparation for a test or exam.

Reading ahead: reading on in a textbook or reading to book to get an idea of what they’ll be learning next.

Rough work: preparing for a lesson or a piece of work by putting notes and information down on paper – for example, writing a paragraph plan for an essay.

Using a homework planner

Children are usually given a planner to help them manage their homework. They’ll be expected to use it every lesson to write down the details of their homework. You will probably be asked to sign their planner every week to confirm that they’ve completed their homework.

The homework planner is also a way for schools and parents to communicate about homework. For example, if your child has found a task too difficult, or if it seems to have taken them an unreasonable amount of time, you can write a note of explanation to the teacher. Or the teacher might write a message to you if your child has failed to hand their homework in.

Most schools also have some form of online portal to help pupils and parents keep track of homework. It might list the tasks your child has been set, provide links to resources or worksheets, and show when their homework is due in, has been handed in, and has been marked.

What if homework isn’t done?

Schools will have different policies concerning what happens if homework isn’t handed in, but it’s usual for children to have to complete the work in detention, which could be at break or lunchtime or after school. If they persistently fail to hand in their homework, you’re likely to be called in to discuss the problem.

Supporting your child with homework

It’s normal for your child to need some help getting used to the greater burden of homework when they start secondary school, and you’ll need to make sure you know what they’re supposed to be doing, chivvy them along when needed, and help them manage their time so it all gets done. Talk to your child about how they’d like to organise their homework: for example, would they prefer to get it out of the way as soon as they get home, or have some time to relax first? Do they want to do it all in one go, or break it down into shorter chunks?

As your child gets used to their new homework schedule, it’s expected that they’ll become more independent and you shouldn’t need to monitor them so closely. However, you can support them by making sure they have a quiet and comfortable place to work without distractions, and all the resources they need. Be available to help if they have questions or need pointing in the right direction, and check their work over every now and then: teachers will expect good presentation as well as accurate work. In some cases, you might need to be more involved, for example, by testing them ahead of an exam.

Many schools have after-school homework clubs where children can get their homework done. A homework club can be useful if pupils have assignments that involve using school resources, such as the library. It’s also helpful if you’re working and so have less time to help with homework, or if your child gets too distracted at home. Teachers or support staff are on hand to help, which can be a particular benefit for children who struggle with homework.

Don’t forget that you can use your child’s homework planner to let their teacher know of any problems with their homework, or ask questions if a task is unclear.  

BBC Bitesize has a range of starting secondary school resources  offering support and information about all aspects of secondary school life for parents and children.

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clock This article was published more than  1 year ago

How false reports of homework overload in America have spread so far

Confusing debate suggests homework is too much when it’s often too little.

A previous version of this column mistakenly referred to the education nonprofit Challenge Success as College Success. The column has been corrected.

Recently I saw in the Phi Delta Kappan magazine an attack on homework by a California high school junior, Colin McGrath. Writing the piece as a letter to his younger brother , he said:

“In a 2020 Washington Post article , Denise Pope described what she learned from a survey of more than 50,000 high school students: On average, they complete 2.7 hours of homework a night . That means you won’t be able to play on the trampoline anymore, ride your bike, or explore any other facet of life.”

My reaction: Huh??!! I’ve spent two decades trying to dispel the myth that our kids all get too much homework. The truth, according to several scholarly sources, is that U.S. high school homework averages about an hour a night.

What most teenagers do with the rest of their free time has little connection to trampolines, bicycles or other healthy pursuits. Scholars say their favorite leisure activities are watching TV, playing video games or maybe both at the same time.

So I looked for that Sept. 1, 2020, article in my newspaper that McGrath mentioned. McGrath quoted Pope correctly. I missed that piece when it came out. Maybe most people did. I looked for Wikipedia’s official answer to this frequently asked question: How much time does the average teenager spend on homework?

I was horrified by what I saw, delivered to millions of Wikipedia users: “High schoolers reported doing an average of 2.7 hours of homework per weeknight, according to a study by The Washington Post from 2018 to 2020 of over 50,000 individuals.”

That’s wrong, but I am used to widespread falsehoods about homework overload. Otherwise responsible writers and filmmakers seem unable to resist adding to the hysteria. The popular 2009 film documentary “Race to Nowhere,” screened in 47 states and 20 countries, left the impression that young Americans everywhere were buckling under homework’s weight, yet the film never told viewers that the average amount is an just an hour a night.

Why ‘Race to Nowhere’ documentary is wrong

When Sara Bennett, an attorney and activist parent, and Nancy Kalish, a journalist specializing in parenting issues, went on the “Today” show in 2006 to publicize their book “The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It,” they said the average homework load had “skyrocketed.” They used that same word in their book.

They were sensationalizing the fact that the average time 6-to-8-year-olds spent on homework went from eight minutes a day in 1981 to 22 minutes a day in 2003. That supposedly awful demand on their time was the equivalent of watching two episodes of “SpongeBob SquarePants.”

The University of Michigan Institute for Social Research reported in 2003 an average of 50 minutes of homework each weekday for 15-to-17-year-olds, based on a nationally representative sample of 2,907 children and adolescents. A 2019 report by the Pew Research Center , based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data, said 15-to-17- year-olds spent on average an hour a day on homework during the school year. The 2019 UCLA Higher Education Research Institute survey of 95,505 college freshmen reported 57 percent of those students, all good enough to get into college, recalled spending five hours or less a week on homework their senior year of high school. Research shows homework has little value in elementary school, but does correlate with higher achievement in high school.

The false notion of teenagers averaging 2.7 hours a night was incorrectly derived from a study by Challenge Success, a nonprofit organization that works on identifying problems and implementing best practices in schools. Pope, the author of the piece in my newspaper, is a co-founder of Challenge Success and a senior lecturer at the Stanford University Graduate School of Education.

Pope is a wonderful writer and scholar whom I have quoted in the past. She can’t be blamed for Wikipedia saying wrongly the Challenge Success study was done by The Post. She also tried to tell readers that her study did NOT use a representative sample of U.S. teens.

She said the students in the study were all from “high-performing schools.” I only wish she had revealed that in the same sentence that she reported the 2.7-hours-per-night homework average. Her note that the study was confined to the best schools appeared in a different paragraph. That may explain why McGrath, Wikipedia and careless people like me failed, at least on first reading, to see that the sample was skewed.

The Weak Case Against Homework

Too much homework can be a problem in high-achieving schools that cater to middle- and upper-class children. But they represent only about half the country. People on my side of the argument would say that three hours of homework a night is fine if the courses raise achievement and college readiness. I don’t think our kids’ favorite pastimes, video games and TV, are as good for them as going deep into those courses. And even three hours of homework leaves another three hours or so each night (plus the weekend) for nonacademic pursuits.

My concern is the less advantaged students who bring the national average down to just one hour a night by doing little or no homework at all. Since 1996 I have been studying hundreds of unusually dedicated public high schools in low-income communities that have raised achievement for their students and made it far more likely they will succeed in college or whatever they do after high school.

Those schools consider homework vital. One of them was led by Deborah Meier, a hero to many progressive educators. She created New York City’s Central Park East High School, where the mostly low-income students heard much about the importance of using time wisely.

“We told our kids … that the school’s explicit work probably required a 40-hour week — maybe more, maybe less,” she said to me. The official school week was about 30 hours. So she kept the school open an extra 10 hours a week — maybe an hour before school, an hour after school and Saturday mornings.

She didn’t call the extra time homework, but made clear it was essential. “Everyone had more to read than could be done while at school — mostly five-plus hours a week,” she said, “and probably another five for exploring and preparing and revising work done during school hours.”

Pope thinks in similar ways. She sees her Challenge Success research “as a way to a much larger conversation about how to create more meaningful and engaging learning, … how to add time for advisory/tutorial and more student to teacher interaction, how to make all the kids in the school feel like they belong and are cared for.”

That will require more than our puny national homework average of an hour a night, after an inadequate average of five hours of class a day. More learning takes time. One step in the right direction would be accepting the need for regular homework, particularly in high school, and dispensing with falsehoods about giving kids too much to learn.

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STUDY MOTIVATION

Is Homework In Schools a Good Thing?

• October 12, 2021

• What are the pros of homework in school?
• What are the cons of homework in school?
• How much homework do UK students get?

For decades (and even centuries, according to some anthropological evidence ), homework has been considered an essential part of formal education . It’s believed that it provides you with the opportunity to ‘learn by doing’ and test and apply what you’ve been taught during school hours. 

However, some modern studies suggest that the practice of homework in schools might not be as helpful as we think it is. According to statistics on homework, homework over a certain level (the 10 minutes per grade standard) has been linked to excessive stress and disruption of personal and social habits in adolescents. It may surprise you to find out that the average amount of homework that kids from countries like the US, UK, France, and Germany currently get is above the standard limit . 😮

If you’re currently a student in the UK, you may be wondering whether homework actually does kids and teenagers any good. Keep reading to find out more about the pros and cons of homework.

What are the pros and cons of homework in school?

Pros: , homework encourages practice.

The primary purpose of homework in schools is to reinforce the habit of practising what you’ve learned in school. Some subjects like maths and languages require daily practice even outside of school hours for you to strengthen the fundamentals you’re learning. 

Practising these subjects regularly from a relatively young age can help equip you for secondary school and college courses like economics and literature, which require a strong knowledge of the basics. Also, independent learning in your own time is a fantastic way for you to identify the subjects you’re most interested in – who knows, you may even find your preferred field of study at an early age through homework! 👍

It allows your parents to be actively involved in your 

A healthy learning environment requires your parents to take an active interest in your education. Your parent or guardian helping you with your homework can help you gain a better understanding of what you’re learning and working on, since you’ll benefit from having anything you’re unsure of explained to you by someone other than your teacher at school. 

Helping you with your homework also makes it possible for your parents to stay involved and keep track of your progress in school in a non-intrusive manner. Additionally, it fosters good communication as you’ll talk to your parents more about the classes you’re attending and other school-related activities that they should know about. ✔️

It’s a great lesson in time management 

Homework in secondary school can be a great way for you to learn how to manage your time better. Older students are often actively involved in academics, sports , and several other extra-curricular activities that facilitate their all-round development. 

Therefore, completing homework outside of school from an early age can help you learn beyond the classroom and gradually get used to managing your time and responsibilities well. ⏰

Homework research encourages independent critical thinking 

Many schools are now opting for homework research as opposed to the traditional practice homework. In fact, it forms the very base of the flipped classroom structure where the students are given review materials before the class to grasp the concepts more quickly once they’re in school.

Homework research allows you to conduct your own research on a topic and form your own thoughts and opinions on what you’re learning. It encourages independent critical thinking from a young age, which is very beneficial for you. 💡

Not every child has a supportive enough home environment 

While most kids in school might have a supportive and peaceful home environment that allows them to study, some children and teenagers aren’t that lucky. Difficult domestic environments can be extremely stressful for kids, which can make independent learning outside of school challenging.

It might be difficult for kids without strong support at home to muster up the time and concentration needed to do the kind of homework that requires independent research and critical thinking. 

It adds to an already packed day 

Homework in schools, especially secondary school, often adds to your already busy days. While time management is an important virtue to learn, homework in secondary school can feel nearly impossible to manage with all the extra-curricular tasks you’re expected to juggle. 😰

Stress related to school can have a negative impact on young people’s mental health . If you find yourself struggling with your workload at school, you should speak to your parent or caretaker, or bring it up with your teacher so that you can get some extra support to help you through it. It’s not unusual for kids and teens to sometimes feel overwhelmed in their learning journey, so don’t be afraid to reach out if you need help!  

There’s no evidence that suggests the extra work produces better academic results for younger kids

A study conducted by the University of Michigan concluded that younger children (below 12 years of age) benefit more from activities such as reading for pleasure and not stipulated school homework. In fact, school homework might lessen the chances of a child reading or writing outside of school as a hobby. 

Research suggests that in many cases, kids having too much homework assigned to them stunts their overall personality development.  

How much homework do UK students get? 

Research on homework shows that the average British school student spends around 3.5 hours on their homework per week. Of these, primary students spend 2.2 hours; secondary students spend 4.3 hours; and sixth form students spend 5.3 hours on homework per week on average. While these numbers aren’t worrisome, they are still over the standard limit prescribed by most child health bodies. ☝️

It’s important for children and young people to communicate with their caretakers if they find that their workload is excessive. If you find yourself getting worried or stressed out over school , we would recommend speaking to your parents or bringing it up with a teacher. The most important thing is your wellbeing, and you need to be able to cope with your homework and make academic progress without increasing your stress levels. 

At GoStudent, we believe learning is a two-sided process that involves active participation from both students and tutors. We have thousands of top tutors available, so if you need any help with learning and homework, GoStudent may be just the ticket. Book a free trial lesson today to try us out! 

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Student Opinion

Should We Get Rid of Homework?

Some educators are pushing to get rid of homework. Would that be a good thing?

By Jeremy Engle and Michael Gonchar

Do you like doing homework? Do you think it has benefited you educationally?

Has homework ever helped you practice a difficult skill — in math, for example — until you mastered it? Has it helped you learn new concepts in history or science? Has it helped to teach you life skills, such as independence and responsibility? Or, have you had a more negative experience with homework? Does it stress you out, numb your brain from busywork or actually make you fall behind in your classes?

Should we get rid of homework?

In “ The Movement to End Homework Is Wrong, ” published in July, the Times Opinion writer Jay Caspian Kang argues that homework may be imperfect, but it still serves an important purpose in school. The essay begins:

Do students really need to do their homework? As a parent and a former teacher, I have been pondering this question for quite a long time. The teacher side of me can acknowledge that there were assignments I gave out to my students that probably had little to no academic value. But I also imagine that some of my students never would have done their basic reading if they hadn’t been trained to complete expected assignments, which would have made the task of teaching an English class nearly impossible. As a parent, I would rather my daughter not get stuck doing the sort of pointless homework I would occasionally assign, but I also think there’s a lot of value in saying, “Hey, a lot of work you’re going to end up doing in your life is pointless, so why not just get used to it?” I certainly am not the only person wondering about the value of homework. Recently, the sociologist Jessica McCrory Calarco and the mathematics education scholars Ilana Horn and Grace Chen published a paper, “ You Need to Be More Responsible: The Myth of Meritocracy and Teachers’ Accounts of Homework Inequalities .” They argued that while there’s some evidence that homework might help students learn, it also exacerbates inequalities and reinforces what they call the “meritocratic” narrative that says kids who do well in school do so because of “individual competence, effort and responsibility.” The authors believe this meritocratic narrative is a myth and that homework — math homework in particular — further entrenches the myth in the minds of teachers and their students. Calarco, Horn and Chen write, “Research has highlighted inequalities in students’ homework production and linked those inequalities to differences in students’ home lives and in the support students’ families can provide.”

Mr. Kang argues:

But there’s a defense of homework that doesn’t really have much to do with class mobility, equality or any sense of reinforcing the notion of meritocracy. It’s one that became quite clear to me when I was a teacher: Kids need to learn how to practice things. Homework, in many cases, is the only ritualized thing they have to do every day. Even if we could perfectly equalize opportunity in school and empower all students not to be encumbered by the weight of their socioeconomic status or ethnicity, I’m not sure what good it would do if the kids didn’t know how to do something relentlessly, over and over again, until they perfected it. Most teachers know that type of progress is very difficult to achieve inside the classroom, regardless of a student’s background, which is why, I imagine, Calarco, Horn and Chen found that most teachers weren’t thinking in a structural inequalities frame. Holistic ideas of education, in which learning is emphasized and students can explore concepts and ideas, are largely for the types of kids who don’t need to worry about class mobility. A defense of rote practice through homework might seem revanchist at this moment, but if we truly believe that schools should teach children lessons that fall outside the meritocracy, I can’t think of one that matters more than the simple satisfaction of mastering something that you were once bad at. That takes homework and the acknowledgment that sometimes a student can get a question wrong and, with proper instruction, eventually get it right.

Students, read the entire article, then tell us:

Should we get rid of homework? Why, or why not?

Is homework an outdated, ineffective or counterproductive tool for learning? Do you agree with the authors of the paper that homework is harmful and worsens inequalities that exist between students’ home circumstances?

Or do you agree with Mr. Kang that homework still has real educational value?

When you get home after school, how much homework will you do? Do you think the amount is appropriate, too much or too little? Is homework, including the projects and writing assignments you do at home, an important part of your learning experience? Or, in your opinion, is it not a good use of time? Explain.

In these letters to the editor , one reader makes a distinction between elementary school and high school:

Homework’s value is unclear for younger students. But by high school and college, homework is absolutely essential for any student who wishes to excel. There simply isn’t time to digest Dostoyevsky if you only ever read him in class.

What do you think? How much does grade level matter when discussing the value of homework?

Is there a way to make homework more effective?

If you were a teacher, would you assign homework? What kind of assignments would you give and why?

Want more writing prompts? You can find all of our questions in our Student Opinion column . Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate them into your classroom.

Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.

Jeremy Engle joined The Learning Network as a staff editor in 2018 after spending more than 20 years as a classroom humanities and documentary-making teacher, professional developer and curriculum designer working with students and teachers across the country. More about Jeremy Engle

Defiant Crumbleys head to prison — 'Not once did they say ... they're not the victims'

In the end, their defiance did them in.

James and Jennifer Crumbley, the embattled parents of the Oxford school shooter who never publicly accepted accountability for their roles in the 2021 massacre, were both sentenced Tuesday to 10-15 years in prison for the deadly rampage that two juries and a judge concluded could have been prevented had the parents made different choices.

While both parents expressed remorse to the families for the loss of their children at the hands of the Crumbleys' son, the prosecutor and the victims' families argued that the Crumbleys did not do one crucial thing: admit they made a mistake.

“Not once did they say, ‘I wished I would have locked the gun up’ and acknowledge that they’re not the victims in this,” Steve St. Juliana, whose 14-year-old daughter Hana died in the shooting, said after a nearly three-hour sentencing hearing that included tears, heartache, anger and frustration.

The judge appeared exasperated as she schooled the Crumbleys on parenting and rejected all their requests for leniency before handing down her sentence. Each parent was convicted of four counts of involuntary manslaughter for failing to stop what two juries decided was a foreseeable consequence of their son's disturbing conduct. Ethan Crumbley, then 15, murdered four classmates and wounded seven other people at Oxford High School on Nov. 30, 2021. His father bought the murder weapon four days earlier as an early Christmas gift for the teen.

Those killed were Tate Myre, 16; Hana St. Juliana, 14; Madisyn Baldwin, 17, and Justin Shilling, 17.

"Parenting is a complex job," Oakland County Circuit Judge Cheryl Matthews said from the bench. "Parents are not expected to be psychic, but these convictions are not about poor parenting. These convictions confirm repeated acts or lack of acts that could have halted an oncoming runaway train, about repeatedly ignoring things that would make a reasonable person feel their hair on the back of their neck stand up."

The judge continued:

"Opportunity knocked over and over again, louder and louder, and was ignored. No one answered. And these two people should have, and sure didn’t," Matthews said.

At both trials, prosecutors argued the Crumbleys ignored a troubled son who was in distress and spiraling downward, but instead of getting him help, they bought him a gun.

'You glorified the use and possession of these weapons'

"Mr. Crumbley … Because of you there was unfettered access to a gun or guns as well as ammunition in your home. You characterized yourself as a martyr and threatened the well-being of the prosecutor," Matthews said, referring to comments that Crumbley made toward Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald in multiple jailhouse phone calls with a relative.

Matthews then turned her attention to the mother."Mrs. Crumbley, you glorified the use and possession of these weapons. Your attitude toward your son and his behaviors was dispassionate and apathetic .... your response to school staff after a 12-minute meeting was, 'Are we done here?' "

Matthews was referring to the pivotal meeting on the morning of the school shooting, when the Crumbleys were summoned to the counselor's office over a violent drawing their son had made of a gun, a human body bleeding, and the words, "The Thoughts won't stop. Help me." The meeting ended with the Crumbleys returning to their jobs and promising to get their son help within 48 hours. School officials concluded the boy was not a threat to himself or anyone else and let him return to class.

Two hours later, he fired his first shot.

James and Jennifer Crumbley are the first parents in America to be held criminally responsible for a school shooting by their child. Their son Ethan pleaded guilty to his crimes and is serving life in prison without parole.

After the parents' sentencing, Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald, who early on said this would be a challenging prosecution but that the facts of this rare case warranted charges, stressed that her office is not done trying to prevent gun violence in Oakland County.

“Don’t look away," she said. "These were tragic and awful deaths, what these families have gone through. And it is preventable. It is preventable — that is my message.”

It's a message she also hammered away at during both trials — and at the sentencing hearing.

"Help me. Blood everywhere. The world is dead," she said, referring to the shooter's writings on his math worksheet on the day of the shooting.

'They come here today and act like they're victims'

The Crumbleys saw those words, she said, and did nothing.

In pushing for a stiff sentence, McDonald argued there has been "no remorse or accountability" by the Crumbleys.

"Remorse does not sound like, ‘I feel really bad.’ … I’m sure they do," McDonald said, but added that's not the kind of remorse and accountability that the victims are looking for.

"What that looks like is, 'We messed up.  We should have done this and we didn’t, and we are very sorry' … and that has not happened."

Yet, she said, "They come here today and act like they're victims."

At the parents' sentencing hearing, the victims' families urged the judge to give the Crumbleys the maximum punishment of 15 years, significantly higher than the state's recommendation of 43-86 months.

'You took four beautiful children from this world'

Nicole Beausoleil, the mother of Madisyn Baldwin, was the first to speak, lambasting the Crumbleys over their parenting decisions and their behaviors since the shooting.

"The lack of compassion you have shown is disgusting … shaking your head during a verdict," as James Crumbley did, is the worst sign of disrespect "I have ever witnessed," Beausoleil said, blaming the parents for the loss of her beautiful daughter and the never-ending pain.

"You created all of this. You created your son's life. … You don't get to look away. … You failed as parents. The punishment that you face will never be enough," she said.

Step by step, the grieving mother took the Crumbleys through the countless painful days she has endured: the day she frantically searched for her daughter in the Meijer parking lot after the shooting, how she collapsed and couldn't talk after learning the girl had died, how she had to listen to her other daughter cry for nights on end over her sister's loss.

"From the moment she was born, I promised myself I would be there no matter what … I wouldn't miss a thing I would always protect her."

Then came the shooting.

" Nov. 30, 2021 … made me break my first promise. As her mom, I didn't protect her."

She also asked the shooter's mom to consider the following:

"While your son was hearing voices and asking for help, I was helping Madisyn pick out classes.

"When you were called to the school over his troubling drawing, I was planning an oil change for my daughter.

"When you were on the phone … trying to figure out where the gun was … I was on the phone with her father trying to figure out where she was.

"When you texted 'Ethan don't do it,' I was texting Madysin 'I love you. Please call Mom.

"When you found out about the lives lost that day, I was still waiting for my daughter in the parking lot.

"When you got a chance to speak with your son … When you asked him 'why' … I was waiting for the last bus that never came.

"While you were hiding, I was planning her funeral.

"I was forced to do the worst possible thing a parent could do. I was forced to say goodbye to my Madisyn."

Hana St. Juliana's sister: Instead of quality time, 'you gave him a gun'

Reina St. Juliana brought many in the courtroom to tears as she talked about losing her 14-year-old sister, Hana —how her little sister, best friend and better half would never see prom, graduation or even her 15th, 16th or 17th birthdays.

"I never got to say goodbye," Reina said. "Hana was only 14 … she took her last breath in a school she hadn't even been in for three months."

She looked at the Crumbleys and said: "The fact is, you did fail as a parent, Jennifer. Both of you … Instead of giving quality time … you gave him a gun."

"Your mistakes created our everlasting nightmare."

Steve St. Juliana, Hana's father, also lashed out at the Crumbleys.

“They chose to stay quiet, they chose to ignore the warning signs,” he said. “They continue to choose to blame everyone but themselves.”

The impact on him has been devastating, he said.

“Hana’s murder has destroyed a large portion of my soul," the father said. "… I remain a shell of the person I used to be.”

Justin Shilling's mother: 'If only they had taken him home'

Jill Soave, Justin Shilling’s mother, said her “trauma and devastation is hard to put into words.” She described Justin's achievements in school and said their family would have been celebrating his 20th birthday soon.

Instead, she is in court.

“The ripple effects of both James’ and Jennifer’s failures to act have devastated us all,” she said. “If only, your honor, they had taken their son to get counseling instead of buying a gun. … If only they had checked his backpack, if only they had taken him home or taken him to counseling instead of abandoning him at that school, I wouldn’t be standing here today.”

Justin's father also pleaded for justice, saying: “This is not normal. Living a life like this is not normal.”

“I just can’t get over the fact that this tragedy was completely avoidable,” Craig Shilling said. “They failed across the board … this type of blatant disregard is unacceptable.”

Tate Myre's father: 'It's time to learn from this'

Buck Myre, the father of Tate Myre, focused mostly on what believes should happen after the Crumbleys' sentencing.

“This is the low-hanging fruit,” Myre said. “Now it’s time to turn our focus to Oxford Schools, who played a role in this tragedy.”

He said he wants the government to investigate the shooting, the purchase of the gun and the response to the massacre.

“That’s when real change happens," Myre said. "When we look at something, evaluate it and apply lessons learned.”

No school officials have been charged in the shooting. Multiple civil suits have been filed against the school and various officials, alleging, among other things, that they put students in harm's way. But the lawsuits are on appeal as judges have held that the school is covered by governmental immunity.

Crumbleys address families and judge

James and Jennifer Crumbley also spoke at the hearing, and asked the judge to consider giving them time served for their sentences. Each parent has been jailed on $500,000 bond for almost 2½ years. The Crumbleys have long argued that they never saw any signs that their son would hurt himself or anyone else, or that he was mentally ill, and did not know of his plans to shoot up his school. They also maintain the gun at issue was not really a gift that their son could freely use, but was hidden in their bedroom armoire, unloaded in a gun case, and that the bullets were stored in a separate drawer.

James Crumbley appeared to be close to tears as he apologized to the families who lost their children.

“My heart is really broken for everyone involved,” he said. “ I understand my words are not going to bring any comfort. I understand that they are not going to relieve any pain, and quite frankly, they probably just don’t believe me," Crumbley said. "However, I really want the families of Madisyn Baldwin, Hana St. Juliana, Tate Myre and Justin Shilling to know how truly sorry I am and how devastated I was when I heard what happened to them."

"I have cried for you and the loss of your children more times than I can count."

The father said that if he’d known what was happening with his son, he would have done things differently, while his attorney said he could not have predicted what could have happened.

Crumbley also echoed Buck Myre's call for more transparency and investigation into the school district and officials’ actions surrounding the shooting.

“It is time that we all know the truth. We have been prohibited from telling the whole truth, the whole truth has not been told. I’m with you Mr. Myre, I want the whole truth,” Crumbley said.

As he spoke, some of the victims' families shook their heads.

Madisyn's mom didn't buy it, and said James Crumbley’s mentioning of holding the school accountable was another attempt to play the victim.

“If he wanted the truth," Beausoleil said after sentencing, "he would have been speaking the truth the whole time and had remorse the whole time.”

Craig Shilling echoed that, saying: “The fact that they didn’t show that level of remorse until the end — that half-baked attempt anyway — was too little too late.”

Jennifer Crumbley also addressed the victims' families, saying she has spent "countless nights" lamenting, praying for forgiveness — she told the prosecution "I have hated you" — and praying that "all the victims are in God's mercy and peace." 

"I sit here today to express my deepest sorrows to the victims' families," Jennifer Crumbley said, adding that the "gravity and weight that this has taken on my heart and soul" can never be measured and "nothing I can say will ease" the pain and heartache suffered by the victims' families.

'My husband and I used to say we had a perfect kid'

She also addressed her controversial testimony, during which she said, "I wouldn't have done anything differently." The comment was cited by the jury foreperson in her case and by Oxford High families as callous and showing her lack of remorse.

"I was horrified to learn that my answer had the effect" that it did, she said, explaining that her answer reflected what she knew at the time.

"This was not something I foresaw," Jennifer Crumbley said of the shooting. "With the benefit of hindsight, my answer would be drastically different."

Especially, she added, "if I thought my son was capable of crimes like these."

"The Ethan I knew was a good kid. My husband and I used to say we had a perfect kid … that's who I saw and thought I knew," she said.

Jennifer Crumbley also laid blame on the school, saying it failed to alert her about her son's troubling behavior on several occasions, and when it did summon her over a troubling drawing, "We were led to believe from school officials and Ethan as well that this was an isolated event," she said. "We were never asked to take him home that day."

Jennifer Crumbley suggested that what happened to her and her husband could happen to any parent, attempting to refute the idea that she and James Crumbley were bad parents or missed warning signs.

“We were good parents,” she said. “We were the average family. Everything we strived for was to make sure our son had the best life we could give him. I know we did our best.”

She also urged the public to take away this message: "This could be any parent … your child can make any decision."

Not just with a gun, she said, but with a knife, a vehicle — and the parents could be held responsible.

But she has come to forgive the prosecutors over time, she said, and continues to try to forgive herself for decisions she cannot change.

"To the victims and the families, I stand today not to ask for your forgiveness, but to express my sincere apologies for the pain that has been caused."

"Alone, I grieve … I will be in my own internal prison for the rest of my life."

Contact Tresa Baldas: [email protected]

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Parents of Michigan school shooter sentenced

By Antoinette Radford and Maureen Chowdhury , CNN

Parents of school shooter sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison. Here's what happened in court today

From CNN staff

The  parents of the teenager who killed four students  in the 2021 school shooting in Oxford, Michigan, were each sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison Tuesday, weeks after being convicted of manslaughter.

James and Jennifer Crumbley, who each had faced up to 15 years in prison, have already been imprisoned for more than two years since their arrest in a Detroit warehouse days after the shooting. Though they were tried separately, their sentencing took place together in an Oakland County courtroom.

They are the first parents to be held criminally responsible for a mass school shooting committed by their child as the nation continues to grapple with the scourge of gunfire on campus and mass shootings.

Here's what everyone said in court today:

• Several family members of the four students killed in the shooting delivered emotional victim impact statements before the judge handed down the sentencing. The mother of Justin Shilling said "the ripple effects of both James and Jennifer's failures to act" to prevent their son from carrying out the deadly shooting " have devastated us all ." The father of Hana St. Juliana said the Crumbleys continue to deflect blame , adding his daughter's death "destroyed a large portion of my very soul."
• Jennifer Crumbley began her statement to the court on Tuesday by expressing her condolences to the victims and their families. She also said a previous statement that she made on the stand in her own defense  during her trial in Februar y was "completely misunderstood." Jennifer Crumbley previously said, “I’ve asked myself if I would have done anything differently, and I wouldn’t have.” Now, before sentencing, she said if she knew her son was capable of the crimes committed, her answer would have "absolutely been different."
• James Crumbley apologized to the victims , something he said he had not been able to do yet. He said he was not aware his son was planning a school shooting, and he asked the judge, "sentence me in a fair way."
• Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald urged the judge to exceed the sentencing guidelines for the Crumbleys and to consider the "devastating impact of their gross negligence that was foreseeable." In separate pre-sentencing memos, the attorneys for the parents asked for them  to be sentenced  to less than five years in prison.
• Judge Cheryl Matthews said the decision should be a deterrent to try to stop school shootings in the future. She pointed to James and Jennifer Crumbley's lack of action, saying, “These convictions confirm repeated acts or lack of acts that could have halted an oncoming runaway train."

Crumbley case sets a precedent on who can be held accountable for a mass shooting

From CNN's Celina Tebor

The historic trials, and stunning verdicts, of James and Jennifer Crumbley  tested the limits of who can be held responsible for a mass shooting.

The prosecution of both parents, and an uptick in other criminal prosecutions and civil lawsuits tied to mass shootings, indicates attorneys are increasingly seeking to hold responsible people — and companies — who didn’t pull the trigger .

Prosecutors over the past few years have been slowly, but steadily, expanding the notion of who can be held accountable for a mass shooting, CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig, a former federal and state prosecutor, said last month.

While he cautioned each case rests on its own merits, "we’ve seen groundbreaking prosecutions of parents and security personnel," he said, "and I’d expect that trend to continue."

The question remains whether prosecution of non-shooters will be effective in reducing the number of mass shootings in the United States. But undoubtedly, it has expanded prosecutors’ tool boxes, according to Ekow Yankah, law professor at the University of Michigan.

“It gives different prosecutors something to aim at – it gives them a new theory, it gives them something to try,” he told CNN. “It gives prosecutors who are frustrated, are facing a devastating crime, a mass shooting that’s hurt their community, some set of actions that they can take.”

Read about some other high-profile prosecutions of non-shooters in recent years.

Prosecutor says she is disappointed James and Jennifer Crumbley did not express remorse

From CNN’s Nicki Brown 

The lead prosecutor in James and Jennifer Crumbley's criminal trials said it was "disappointing" that the parents didn't express remorse.

"Feeling bad is natural, and we don't dispute that they feel bad ... that's not what's important to victims of crime," Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said to reporters after the Crumbleys' sentencing Tuesday. "What they want and need most of all is remorse, which means acknowledgment of the wrongdoing and some sort of reconciliation or apology for that — and that didn't come."

The prosecutor said she didn't think that the case would set a precedent for parents of other school shooters.

"There's a difference between precedent-setting and rare, and this is really a rare set of facts, it really is," McDonald said. 

"Most of us know that you have to exercise reasonable care at least to prevent other people from the dangers that you know are foreseeable," she added.

She said her team did the "absolute best" they could, and the victim's families know that.

"It's really hard ... to remark about how hard we work and how hard it's been when you're looking in the eyes of these parents every day, who get up in unbelievable pain and grief and see this play out every day and they still go on," she said. "And so, my focus is there."

James and Jennifer Crumbley each sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison

James and Jennifer Crumbley, the parents of the teenager who killed four students in a 2021 school shooting in Oxford, Michigan, were each sentenced Tuesday to 10 to 15 years in prison, respectively, weeks after they were convicted of manslaughter.

They will receive credit for 858 days already served.

Sentence for Crumbleys should be a deterrent, judge says

From CNN's Elise Hammond

The judge presiding over the sentencing of James and Jennifer Crumbley said the decision should be a deterrent to try to stop school shootings in the future.

"Opportunity knocked over and over again, louder and louder, and was ignored," Judge Cheryl Matthews said. "No one answered and these two people should have and sure didn’t."

She said she is "aware of my job in this situation” and promised not to be “swayed by public opinion” when handing down the sentencing decision.

Talking to the families in the courtroom, Matthews said she could never understand the pain they are experiencing, but reassured them, “I saw what you saw and I heard what you heard” during the trials.

Prosecutor urges judge to consider the "devastating impact" of the Crumbleys' "gross negligence"

From CNN's Nicki Brown

Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald urged Judge Cheryl Matthews to exceed the sentencing guidelines for James and Jennifer Crumbley, asking the judge to consider the "devastating impact of their gross negligence that was foreseeable."

"I want to be clear, remorse does not sound like, 'I feel really bad.' I'm sure they do. I don't dispute they feel bad, I don't dispute they have grief. That's not the kind of remorse and accountability these victims are looking for," McDonald said in court Tuesday.

She continued, addressing the judge:

"When fashioning a sentence, it is absolutely critical that you listen and consider the impact of what that gross negligence caused. So we're asking you to exceed the guidelines because I believe all of the factors pursuant to the case law, with the necessary consideration of the impact of these crimes, justifies you to do. We're asking you, the people are asking you, to consider the devastating impact of their gross negligence that was foreseeable."

James Crumbley apologizes to the families of his son's victims

From CNN's Antoinette Radford

James Crumbley, the father of Michigan school shooter Ethan Crumbley, addressed the courtroom, opening his statement by apologizing to the victims, something he said he had not been able to do yet.

"I want to say I can't imagine the pain and agony ... for the families that have lost their children and what they are experiencing and what they are going through. As a parent, our biggest fear is losing our child or our children, and to lose a child is unimaginable. My heart is really broken for everybody involved," he said.

"I really want the families of Madisyn Baldwin, Hana St Juliana, Tate Myre and Justin Shilling to know how truly sorry I am, and how devastated I was when I heard what happened to them," Crumbley said.

Crumbley added that he was not aware his son was planning a school shooting, and he asked Judge Cheryl Matthews to "sentence me in a fair way."

Jennifer Crumbley says previous statement made in court was misinterpreted

From CNN's Maureen Chowdhury

Jennifer Crumbley began her statement to the court by expressing her condolences to the victims and their families.

"I sit here today to express my deepest sorrows for the families of Hana, Tate, Madisyn, Justin and to all those affected on November 30, 2021," she said.

Crumbley said that a previous statement made on the stand was "completely misunderstood."

When she took the stand in her own defense during her trial in Februar y, she had said, “I’ve asked myself if I would have done anything differently, and I wouldn’t have.”

On Tuesday, Crumbley said that she did not foresee the actions of her son and therefore would not have done anything different, and that is how she interpreted the question.

"With the benefit of hindsight and information I have now, my answer would be drastically different," she said.

Crumbley added that if she knew her son was capable of the crimes committed, her answer would have "absolutely been different."

 Father of Hana St. Juliana says Crumbleys "choose to blame everyone but themselves"

James and Jennifer Crumbley continue to deflect blame, the father of a victim of the 2021 Oxford High School shooting said at the Crumbleys' sentencing Tuesday.

"The defendants, through their choices, through their indifference and gross negligence, enabled their son to murder my daughter Hana and three other children," Steve St. Juliana, the father of Hana St. Juliana, said in a victim impact statement Tuesday.

"They chose to stay quiet. They chose to ignore the warning signs. And now, as we've heard through all of the objections, they continue to choose to blame everyone but themselves," he said.

Steve St. Juliana said his daughter's death "destroyed a large portion of my very soul."

"I will never think back fondly on her high school and college graduations. I will never walk her down the aisle as she begins the journey of starting her own family. I am forever denied the chance to hold her or her future children in my arms," he added.

St. Juliana said his position on the Crumbleys' sentencing evolved throughout the trial as the defendants' "defiance" increased. "Hana, Madisyn, Tate, and Justin are the ones who have lost everything — not the defendants," he said before requesting the parents receive the maximum possible sentence.

Buck Myre, the father of victim Tate Myre, gave his impact statement following Steve St. Juliana. He was the last person to give an impact statement.

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James and Jennifer Crumbley, parents of Michigan shooter, sentenced to 10 to 15 years in prison

Jennifer and James Crumbley, the first parents of a mass school shooter in the U.S. to be convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the attack, were sentenced Tuesday in a Michigan courtroom to 10 to 15 years in prison.

The sentence came after the court heard statements from the family members of Tate Myre, 16, Hana St. Juliana, 14, Madisyn Baldwin, 17, and Justin Shilling, 17 . The students were killed when the Crumbleys' son, Ethan, went on a shooting rampage at Oxford High School in Michigan on Nov. 30, 2021.

"You created all of this," Nicole Beausoleil, Baldwin's mother, said through tears. "You failed as parents. The punishment that you face will never be enough."

Beausoleil recalled the final hours of her daughter's life, comparing them with the Crumbleys' actions before and during the shooting. "When you texted 'Ethan don't do it,' I was texting Madisyn: 'I love you. Please call Mom,'" she said.

Reina St. Juliana, the sister of Hana, brought many to tears as she spoke of how her sister would never see her prom, graduation or birthdays.

"I never got to say goodbye," Reina said. "Hana was only 14 ... she took her last breath in a school she hadn't even been in for three months."

Jill Soave, mother of Justin Shilling, asked the judge to hand down the maximum sentence possible to both parents. "The ripple effects of both James' and Jennifer's failures to act have devastated us all," she said. "This tragedy was completely preventable."

Judge Cheryl Matthews addressed both parents before handing down the sentence, "Mr. Crumbley, it's clear to this court that because of you, there was unfettered access to a gun or guns, as well as ammunition in your home.

"Mrs. Crumbley, you glorified the use and possession of these weapons," she added.

Both parents will credited for time already spent in jail.

Matthews also barred the pair or their "agents" from any contact with the families of the four students. She said she would also rule on the parents' rights to contact their son.

Jennifer and James Crumbley also addressed the court ahead of their sentence.

"The dragging this has had on my heart and soul cannot be expressed in words, just as I know this is not going to ease the pain and suffering of the victims and their families," Jennifer Crumbley said.

Jennifer Crumbley used her statement to clarify her trial testimony when she said she would not have done anything differently leading up to the shooting. It was "completely misunderstood," she said Tuesday, adding that her son had seemed "so normal" and that she could not have foreseen the attack.

She said prosecutors tried to paint her and her husband as parents "so horrible, only a school or mass shooter could be bred from."

"We were good parents. We were the average family. We weren't perfect, but we loved our son and each other tremendously," Jennifer Crumbley said.

James Crumbley apologized to the families during his statement.

"I cannot express how much I wish I had known what was going on with him and what was going to happen, because I absolutely would have done a lot of things differently," he said.

Prosecutors asked that each parent be given 10 to 15 years in prison after separate juries found them each guilty of four counts of involuntary manslaughter earlier this year. Their son, 15 at the time of the shooting, is serving a life sentence for the murders.

The parents have shown no remorse for their actions, prosecutors told Matthews in a sentencing memo . They told the juries that the Crumbleys bought their son the gun he used and ignored troubling signs about his mental health.

Legal experts have said the case, which drew national attention, could influence how society views parents' culpability when their children access guns and cause harm with them. Whether the outcome encourages prosecutors to bring charges against parents going forward remains to be seen.

Why were the Crumbleys culpable in their son's crimes?

The Crumbleys' son went on a rampage in the halls of Oxford High School hours after his parents were called to the school by counselors to discuss concerns over disturbing drawings he had done on a math assignment. Prosecutors said the parents didn't tell school officials their son had access to guns in the home and left him at school that day.

James Crumbley purchased the gun used in the shooting, and in a post on social media Jennifer Crumbley said it was a Christmas present for the boy. The prosecution said the parents could have prevented the shooting if they had taken ordinary care to secure the gun and taken action when it was clear their son was having severe mental health struggles.

The prosecution cited messages the teen sent months before the shooting to his mother that said he saw a "demon" in their house and that clothes were flying around. He also texted a friend that he had "paranoia" and was hearing voices. In a journal, he wrote: "I have zero HELP for my mental problems and it's causing me to shoot up" the school.

The Crumbleys also tried to flee law enforcement when it became clear they would face charges, prosecutors said.

Defense attorneys said the parents never foresaw their son's actions. Jennifer Crumbley portrayed herself as an attentive mother when she took the stand in her own defense, and James Crumbley's lawyer said that the gun didn't really belong to the son, that the father properly secured the gun and that he didn't allow his son to use it unsupervised. In an interview with the Detroit Free Press, part of the USA TODAY Network,  the jury foreman in James Crumbley's trial said  storage of the gun was the key testimony that drove him to convict.

Parents asked for house arrest, time served

James Crumbley has asked to be sentenced to time already served since his arrest in December 2021, according to the prosecutors' sentencing memo. Jennifer Crumbley hoped to serve out a sentence on house arrest while living in her lawyer's guest house.

Prosecutors rejected the requests in the memo to the judge, saying neither had shown remorse for their roles in the deaths of the four children. James Crumbley also was accused of threatening Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald in a jail phone conversation, Keast said, showing his "chilling lack of remorse."

"Such a proposed sentence is a slap in the face to the severity of tragedy caused by (Jennifer Crumbley's) gross negligence, the victims and their families," Assistant Oakland County Prosecutor Marc Keast wrote of the mother's request in a sentencing memo.

Each involuntary manslaughter count carries up to 15 years in prison, though typically such sentences are handed down concurrently, not consecutively. The judge also has the discretion to go above or below the state advisory guidelines, which recommended a sentencing range of 43 to 86 months − or a maximum of about seven years. The state guideline is advisory, based on post-conviction interviews and facts of the case.

Here's how much money I made as a software engineer at Meta, Apple, and Oracle

• Sandeep Rao is a software engineer who has worked at Meta, Apple, and Oracle. 
• When he first started his career as a new graduate, his compensation was only $15,000.
• He explains how, thanks to high performance and negotiation skills, he now makes nearly $700,000. 

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Sandeep Rao, a 32-year-old software engineer based in San Jose, California. Business Insider has verified his income with documentation. This essay has been edited for length and clarity.

My salary journey in Big Tech has seen my total compensation — which includes base salary, bonuses, and stocks — increase from $15,000 in 2012 to $685,000 in 2024.

I'm a staff software engineer and have worked at three different tech companies, moving from Oracle to Apple to Meta. Over my career, I've led the development of successful software apps and features from scratch that are used every day by millions of people across the world.

While I have made my career moves primarily based on which areas of software engineering I'd get to work on, compensation is also important to me, so I've been strategic and negotiated for higher salaries with each move.

Tech companies use tools like additional equity to retain high-performing employees. In my experience, if you're consistently a top performer at your organization, it's certainly possible to keep your pay at or above market level and have a rewarding career within your company.

I took a low-paying job to get my foot in the door

While I got my undergraduate degree in electrical engineering , I realized midway through college that software engineering was my passion and pivoted to pursue a career in software instead.

My first job was as a software developer at Oracle in India. While Oracle isn't generally low-paying in the tech industry, my salary of 850,000 rupees, or $15,000, was low compared to what new grads were making at that time in competing Big Tech companies like Microsoft or Amazon because it was a "take it or leave it" new grad offer.

The work was unappealing to me because it didn't align with my career interests — I didn't want to continue building expertise in that specific area of software engineering — but I took it to get my foot in the door of a Big Tech company and build credibility.

I knew I eventually wanted to end up where all the action is — Silicon Valley . I worked at Oracle from 2012 to 2014, and during this time, I applied to graduate schools in the US because I felt a formal computer science degree would help me compete with the talented people in the Valley.

I got accepted into a graduate program in computer science at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. I left behind my family and friends in India and moved to the US with nothing but a suitcase and $65,000 in student debt.

Grad school was hard, but the doors it opened for me made the struggle worth it.

I was ecstatic to get a job at Apple

I finished grad school and got a job as a software engineer at Apple in Cupertino, California, where my base salary was $115,000.

I was ecstatic to work at one of the best companies in the world and felt my dreams were coming true. But I realized I wanted to work on more direct user-facing applications rather than on technology that ran under the hood.

Initially, I considered looking for new opportunities within Apple, but between high taxes, the high cost of living, and my student loans, I felt more compelled to switch companies, given that I'd likely receive a significant salary bump .

I had gotten a very small cost-of-living raise on my base salary at Apple, but it wasn't significant; not getting a bigger raise wasn't a big motivator in my decision to change companies, but it certainly made my choice easier.

My negotiation skills helped me get a 10% salary increase

At the end of 2017, I moved to Meta (then Facebook) in Menlo Park, California. I wanted to experience the culture of younger internet-based companies whose products are used by billions of people.

When I received my offer, I did my research to get a clear understanding of what my market value was and what salary I wanted to land on. I also learned what parts of my total compensation are negotiable, such as stocks and the sign-on bonus, and what is non-negotiable, like base salary and annual bonuses.

I was prepared to negotiate and walked away with an offer of $140,000, which was 10% more than their original offer.

In 2021, I landed a large-scale project at Meta that added a lot of value to the Messenger app and worked with several cross-functional teams across engineering, design, data science, and legal.

My accomplishments, such as this one, and high performance at work got me the promotions, visibility, and leverage to negotiate for higher pay and a successful salary journey.

Every year between 2018 to 2023, my base salary increased — as did my total compensation — through a combination of performance-based yearly stock refreshers, additional boosts from promotions, and stock market appreciation.

Related stories

Compensation in a tech career usually gets more and more equity-heavy than salary-heavy, so base salaries don't increase as quickly as equity, but my salary and total annual compensation steadily rose:

2012-2014: $15,000 total compensation

Grad School

2014-2016: $0 total compensation

Student loan debt: $65,000

2016: $130,000 total compensation

2017: $165,000 total compensation

2018: $230,000 total compensation

2019: $240,000 total compensation

2020: $350,000 total compensation (promotion)

2021: $510,000 total compensation

2022: $375,000 total compensation (promotion, but total compensation dropped due to stock price drop)

2023: $545,000 total compensation

In 2024, I'm projected to make $685,000 through a combination of base salary, bonuses, and stock.

Five strategies for increasing my compensation package

Over the years, I learned five salary strategies that helped me grow my salary and overall compensation:

1. Always do your homework about market rates for your role, level, and location — especially when you switch jobs.

Switching jobs is a good way to increase your income.

Even if money may not be the primary motivator for a job switch, I always make sure to be conscious and strategic about my compensation by doing salary research to avoid leaving any money on the table.

When I started doing salary research during my switch to Meta, I found out my market value was much higher than what I was making at Apple at that time. This helped me start my negotiations with Meta at the market rate rather than the salary I was making.

I used Levels.fyi , Blind , and Glassdoor to find salary information and clearly understand my market value. Keep yourself updated on these benchmarks even if you don't plan on a job change anytime soon, so you know you're on par with the market, and any salary difference is offset by other factors such as better work-life balance.

2. Never let your bad salary "baggage" carry over to your new job.

If your salary isn't up to market standards right now, don't let it affect your pay at the next job. Otherwise, it'll lead to a cycle where you'll be underpaid for the rest of your career.

Employers and recruiters could use your salary history to give you only a modest raise, while your actual market value could easily be double or triple your most recent salary.

In California, labor laws make it illegal for employers to ask you about your current salary and salary history. You're also allowed to ask potential employers for the pay range for the position you're applying for.

If your state has similar protections, just being aware of this law can help you make any corrections to your pay during negotiations. This helped me start offer negotiations from my market value instead of my current pay.

3. Sometimes, you have to take a leap of faith to make that 10x impact on your career.

That could involve switching from a non-tech job to a tech job or taking a short-term hit for long-term gain. For example, I picked Oracle for my first job despite the low pay and unappealing work so I could build credibility to get into a Tier 1 grad school.

I also took a loan of about $65,000 to pay for Carnegie Mellon, even though I could have chosen to go to a cheaper public university.

Deciding to work at Oracle and attend Carnegie Mellon cost me a few years and a lot of debt, but doing so opened doors unlike anything else, and I haven't looked back ever since.

4. Negotiate to keep your base salary from falling behind

It's inevitable for your salary to fall behind as you stay longer at a company, especially in tech due to restricted stock unit (RSU) "cliffs."

Most RSU packages offered to new employees in the tech industry have a two- to four-year vesting period. Unless the employer offers a significant pay bump along the way, total compensation usually takes a drop after this vesting period. Many companies also offer annual performance-based stock refreshers to lower this salary gap, but they're usually not as large as the initial grant. 

If you love working at your company and feel forced to move just to get a raise, you can ask your senior leadership to make a "correction." After all, it's much more expensive and time-consuming for employers to hire new people than to retain good employees.

Most Big Tech companies have employee retention programs like additional or discretionary equity. Additional equity programs are mainly used to retain high-performing employees, so they're usually highly selective.

This is how I was able to keep my compensation at or above market level despite spending six years at Meta. When I was reaching the end of my vesting period in my fourth year, I had a conversation with my senior leadership to see if there was any room for a pay correction so I could go back to focusing on my work 100% without worrying about salary.

Being prepared with my predicted compensation drop and market data greatly helped me build a cogent narrative going in. If you're consistently a top performer at your organization, it's certainly possible to keep your pay at or above market level and have a rewarding career within your company.

5. Don't assume people will reward your work or anticipate your needs — ask.

Always ask for what you want , whether it's a raise or that interesting project that just came in. The worst that will happen is you'll get a "no." If you don't ask, nobody will know, or even worse, people may assume that you're happy with what you have and move on. 

I used this strategy when I heard of a new company initiative and asked to be a founding engineer because I was looking to create more impact in my role. Despite the high risk and ambiguity involved, I successfully delivered on the projects, which eventually led to a promotion. None of this would've been possible if I hadn't asked. 

At the end of the day, you're your biggest advocate when it comes to your salary and career journey. There's no substitute for hard work, but being strategic about how you achieve your goals can go a long way. Sometimes, you have to take big risks and step out of your comfort zone to get that high-paying dream job.

If you want to share your career progression and salary journey, email Jane Zhang at [email protected] .

Watch: Nearly 50,000 tech workers have been laid off — but there's a hack to avoid layoffs

• Main content

Parents of Michigan school shooter Ethan Crumbley both sentenced to 10-15 years for involuntary manslaughter

PONTIAC, Mich. — The first parents to ever be charged , then convicted, in their child’s mass shooting at a U.S. school were both sentenced Tuesday to 10 to 15 years in prison after they faced the victims' families at a sentencing hearing in a Michigan courtroom.

James Crumbley, 47, and his wife, Jennifer, 46, were sentenced one after another by Circuit Court Judge Cheryl Matthews as they appeared together for the first time since they attended joint hearings before their landmark trials were separated last fall. Their son, Ethan, now 17, pleaded guilty as an adult to the 2021 shooting at Oxford High School in suburban Detroit and was sentenced to life in prison.

Matthews' sentencing decision was in line with what Oakland County prosecutors had asked for after both parents were found guilty on four counts of involuntary manslaughter, one for each of the students their son killed.

Matthews told the Crumbleys that the jury convictions were "not about poor parenting" but about how they repeatedly ignored warning signs that a "reasonable person" would have seen.

"These convictions confirm repeated acts that could have halted an oncoming runaway train," she said.

The couple will get credit for time served in an Oakland County jail since their arrests in the wake of the shooting on Nov. 30, 2021. The pair sat apart at the defense table with their lawyers beside them as the families of the four students who were killed asked before sentencing for the maximum terms to be imposed.

"When you texted, 'Ethan don't do it,'  I was texting, 'Madisyn I love you, please call mom,'" Nicole Beausoleil, the mother of shooting victim Madisyn Baldwin, 17, told the Crumbleys. "When you found out about the lives your son took that day, I was still waiting for my daughter in the parking lot.

"The lack of compassion you've shown is outright disgusting," she added through tears.

Jill Soave, the mother of another slain student, Justin Shilling, 17, said the parents' inaction on the day of the shooting "failed their son and failed us all."

Justin's father, Craig Shilling, said he was troubled by Jennifer Crumbley's testimony during her trial in which she said she would not have done anything differently, even today.

"The blood of our children is on your hands, too," Craig Shilling said.

James Crumbley wore an orange jumpsuit and headphones to help with his hearing, and Jennifer Crumbley wore a gray-and-white jumpsuit. He did not look at his wife, while she glanced in his direction.

In Michigan, prosecutors said, felonies that rise out of the same event must run concurrently, so the most Matthews could have imposed is 15 years in total. And while prosecutors wanted the parents to receive sentences that exceeded the advisory guideline range, Matthews had the ultimate discretion, weighing factors such as past criminal behavior and the circumstances of their crimes.

Before she was sentenced, Jennifer Crumbley told the court that she felt "deep remorse, regret and grief" about the shooting, but she also deflected some of the blame onto school officials and took offense to the prosecution's strategy portraying her as a neglectful mother .

"We were good parents," Crumbley said. "We were the average family. We weren't perfect, but we loved our son and each other tremendously."

James Crumbley also addressed the court, explaining to the judge that he did not know beforehand about his son's planned attack on his school and telling the victims' families directly that he would have acted differently on the day of the shooting.

"Please note that I am truly sorry for your loss as a result of what my son did," he said. "I cannot express how much I wish I had known what was going on with him or what was going to happen."

Matthews said during Tuesday's sentencing that the family would not be housed together and that the state Corrections Department has indicated James and Ethan Crumbley specifically will not be in the same facility given their relationship. Ethan is being held in a state prison 17 miles from Oxford High School. Jennifer Crumbley would be sent to the state's only women's prison.

James and Jennifer Crumbley have not been able to communicate as part of a no contact order since their arrests.

In both parents' cases, prosecutors wrote that their "gross negligence changed an entire community forever."

They both could have prevented the shooting with "tragically simple actions," prosecutors wrote, adding that they "failed to take any action when presented with the gravest of dangers."

Legal experts had suggested James Crumbley could have faced a harsher sentence than his wife after prosecutors said he made threats in jail.

During his trial, Matthews restricted his communication to only his lawyer and clergy.

The sentencing memo for James Crumbley referred to allegations that he made threats against the prosecutor and said that "his jail calls show a total lack of remorse" and that "he blames everyone but himself."

The memo details the expletive-ridden threats he is alleged to have directly addressed to the prosecutor on multiple recorded jail calls. In one call before the trial, he said, "Karen McDonald, you're going down," according to prosecutors. In other calls, he threatened retribution, they said.

James Crumbley’s lawyer, Mariell Lehman, wrote in court documents that the calls did not include threats to physically harm the prosecutor but that he expressed his desire to ensure that McDonald is not able to continue practicing law as a result of her actions in the case.

"It is clear Mr. Crumbley is venting to loved ones about his frustrations related to the lack of investigation done by the prosecution prior to authorizing charges," Lehman wrote, saying her client is understandably angry at his situation.

The prosecution's memo also says James Crumbley asserted his innocence in a pre-sentence report, indicating a lack of remorse.

"I feel horrible for what happened and would do anything to be able to go back in time and change it! But I can't. And I had nothing to do with what happened," he wrote, according to the prosecution memo. "I don't know why my son did what he did. HE is the only one who knows."

Lehman has not said whether she plans to appeal James Crumbley's verdict, while a lawyer for Jennifer Crumbley, Shannon Smith, has written that she will.

Two separate trials

James Crumbley did not take the stand during his trial. His wife testified that she placed the responsibility of securing the 9 mm semiautomatic handgun used in the shooting on her husband.

Asked whether she would have done anything differently, Jennifer Crumbley told jurors, "I don't think I'm a failure as a parent."

Prosecutors argued that she knew of her son's deteriorating mental health and social isolation and that he had access to a gun but that she cared more about her hobbies and carrying on an extramarital affair than about being present at home.

Her defense lawyer attempted to portray her as a caring mother, albeit one who did not know her son was capable of such violence — suggesting instead that his school failed to fully inform her of his troubles and that her husband was responsible for the weapon.

Smith continued to defend her client in her sentencing memo.

"Criticizing Mrs. Crumbley for being 'rarely home' is a sexist and misogynistic attack on a mother," Smith wrote.

In a pre-sentence report, Jennifer Crumbley said she has the hindsight now to know she would have handled things differently.

"With the information I have now, of course my answer would be hugely different," she said. "There are so many things that I would change if I could go back in time."

Both her and her husband's trials centered on the day of the shooting.

A day after Thanksgiving, prosecutors said, James Crumbley bought their son the handgun, while Jennifer Crumbley took him to a gun range that weekend.

On Tuesday, a teacher said she had found a note on Ethan's desk with a drawing of a gun and a person who had been shot, along with messages including: "The thoughts won't stop. Help me."

That discovery prompted the school to summon the parents for a meeting, but school officials testified that they declined to bring him home because they had to go back to work.

The officials also said that if the parents had informed them that their son had access to a gun, they would have been more authoritative to ensure immediate safety.

Ethan would go on to commit the school shooting later that afternoon, killing Baldwin; Shilling; Tate Myre, 16; and Hana St. Juliana, 14.

Victims' families want accountability

In the aftermath of the trials, the victims' families have demanded further accountability. They are seeking changes to governmental immunity laws that protect schools from being sued and want to see a requirement for independent reviews after any mass shooting.

Oakland County prosecutors have said they do not plan to charge anyone else in connection with the massacre.

Buck Myre, the father of Tate Myre, said during Tuesday's sentencing that families still want a government-led investigation.

"It's time to drive real change from this tragedy," he told the judge.

Later, James Crumbley stood and addressed Buck Myre directly when he was given the chance to speak.

"It is time that we all know the truth," he said. "I, too, want the truth, because you have not had it."

Selina Guevara and Maggie Vespa reported from Pontiac and Erik Ortiz from New York.

Selina Guevara is an NBC News associate producer, based in Chicago.

NBC News Correspondent

Erik Ortiz is a senior reporter for NBC News Digital focusing on racial injustice and social inequality.