A number of schools around the country are mulling similar moves.
In Massachusetts, for example, Needham High School Principal Paul Richards sought to limit stress after three student suicides in recent years. Richards urges teachers not to give homework over school vacations and to be more flexible about assignment deadlines. He also ended the tradition of publishing the school's academic honor roll in the local newspaper, which made him the butt of jokes and criticism from "Tonight" host comedian Jay Leno and conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh.
But Richards has stood firm, saying that critics don't understand the amount of stress his college-bound students feel, even as they try to act cool. For example, "there are perceptions that Boston College only takes two seniors from each high school," said Richards. "Students hear this and start ranking each other," adding more pressure to an already "product-oriented and competitive" culture that's "gone into overdrive."
Education researchers who study student workloads say that such high-pressure situations may be more the exception than the rule, however.
"Most of what you hear" about excessive homework "is anecdotal," says Tom Loveless, director of the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank. "You have a group of kids who take tons of Advanced Placement (AP) classes and have lots of extracurricular activities" who experience a major school-related time crunch, he says. "But they're not numerous.