I’ve had enough. I’m tired of the constant crossword puzzles and the irrelevant articles. If I have to fill out another worksheet that barely relates to the class’s curriculum, just for the sake of filling out another worksheet, I actually might scream.

With all due respect, the job of a teacher is to teach content, so teach me. I get nothing from mindlessly highlighting letters on a word search. I want to have discussions about the content with my peers; I want to read engaging articles; I want to learn. And if I can’t do that, then don’t give me work.

This isn’t my senioritis speaking. Busy work has always been my pet peeve. Every time I open Schoology and see ten new assignments from one class, I die a little inside. I’m not saying there should be no school assignments; I’m just saying that there should only be assignments that further knowledge of the curriculum.

It’s funny that when the quarter came to an end last week, teachers were rushing to fit in the last few big assignments before Friday. Yet, all throughout the quarter, we’ve done tedious, irrelevant assignments that could have been omitted from the class with no consequences. If we had opted to skip that busy work, we would have had more time to focus on the important assignments that were actually valuable to the curriculum and we wouldn’t have to spend the last week of every quarter scrambling to turn in a ton of new assignments.

I struggle to see the value in overloading students with assignments that don’t further their knowledge. It gives teachers more assignments to grade, students more assignments to do, and, most importantly, it’s boring and makes students not want to come to school. If I show up to school and spend every class completing pointless busy work that I could have easily done at home, all I can think is “why am I here?” Why am I spending my time here doing busy work for seven hours when I could have done this all at home in three? It’s a waste of time to come to school and spend all of my classes doing work that I could’ve done from the comfort of my own room. So, I’m begging you, for the love of education, please stop with the busy work. Engage your students and make school worth their time.