She assists in brain function, keeps emotions in check, and reduces the risk of diseases. Who is she?

 She is sleep. According to the CDC, “Children and adolescents who do not get enough sleep have a higher risk for many health problems, including obesity, type 2 diabetes, poor mental health, and injuries.” Just like how a laptop will have lower brightness if it doesn’t sleep, people are the same way. In this day and age, sleep deprivation is becoming all too common, especially among high schoolers. 

Although there’s multiple factors that affect the amount of sleep students get, the main reason is that students have too much on their plate and not enough time to eat what’s on their plate. Senior Ella Fearnside claims that she’s often sleep deprived because she has oceans of homework, often taking hours to finish. She does dance in the mornings and as a result, usually wakes up at 4:30, which is earnestly early. She stated, “I get 4 hours of sleep, man.” The CDC claims that teens should receive between 8-10 hours of sleep, and Ella receives half of that. She often can’t function, focus, or talk as a result, and often has trouble controlling her emotions. An anonymous student stated, “It causes me to cry in the bathroom”. If Ella doesn’t get enough sleep, it takes her longer to do homework because she can’t focus, and this causes Ella to sleep even later, repeating the cycle. There aren’t simple solutions to this problem, however many classmates proposed that the Boise High dance practice be arranged to begin later in the day.

Although most students at Boise High don’t receive the rest that they need, which would be considered less than 7 hours of sleep, there’s still a handful of students who do receive sufficient sleep. For example, sophomore Alice Li explained that her parents force her to sleep when it’s too late and gets about 8.5 hours of sleep almost every school night. For her, homework doesn’t take too long, and she is able to manage her out of school activities like orchestra. Around 10, she falls asleep and around 6:30, she arises, but often, Alice stresses a lot at night, which means she sometimes loses hours of sleep. 

Clearly, sleep deprivation is an enormous problem, and is becoming more prevalent due to stress, early wake-up-times, and workload that students receive from school and other activities. Not getting enough sleep can have tremendous negative effects on the mental health, physical health, and the overall well being of students. Fellow classmates believe that this issue should be taken more seriously and creative solutions need to be developed.