It really is true that there's a lot of time built into the day at St. Albans. Here are the gory details for those who are interested:

Schedule has a 7 day cycle. 30 total academic class periods of 65 minutes each during that cycle (that would include art classes, which are scheduled in regular academic periods). Classes meet in 5 out of the 7 days. Built in time for performing arts, 4 times in 7 days, 50 minutes (so, a free period if you aren't in the chorus or orchestra).

So here's a schedule for an Upper Schooler taking 5 classes (max allowed would be 6) -- let's say English, history, math, science, foreign language.

Cycle Day 1: English, History, Math, Science, 65 minute free period (4 classes, 1 Free Period)

Cycle Day 2: Foreign language, English, History, Math (4 classes) PLUS 55 minutes if free during performing arts period

Cycle Day 3: Science, Free Period, Foreign Language, English (3 Classes, 1 Free Period)

Cycle Day 4: History, Math, Science, Free Period, Foreign Language (4 classes, 1 Free Period)

Cycle Day 5: English, History, Math, Science (4 classes) PLUS 50 minutes if free during performing arts period

Cycle Day 6: Free Period, Foreign Language, English, History (3 classes, 1 Free Period) PLUS 50 minutes if free during performing arts period

Cycle Day 7: Math, Science, Free Period, Foreign Language (3 classes, 1 Free Period) PLUS 50 minutes if free during performing arts period

If this makes your eyes glaze over or fall out of your head, sorry. And it should be noted that if a student takes 6 classes they lose the 5 free periods (although they still have 4 days out of 7 with 50 mins free time if they are not in chorus/orchestra). Taking 6 classes while being in chorus/orchestra would be busy indeed -- I don't think many students fall into that category, though.

The typical kid has does not have to do 5 subjects of homework per night and has a lot of time built into the day. So whomever posted that using the daytime study time wisely is right on.

The NCS schedule is pretty identical, with some minor differences such as the day in the week they have their Assembly vs. chapel.

Looks like we were simultaneously posting. Sorry for the duplication.

Correction to your summary--with new block schedule at NCS, most days the girls will only have 3-4 of their classes, not 5. So the expected homework load would be more like 2-3 hours, and for those who can work ahead a little on the weekends, it would be even less. Very manageable for my 11th grader.

Anonymous wrote:In this entire thread, I've only read 8 or 9 actual answers to the question. Here's what I've culled:

GDS
Parent 1: 2-3 hours in Grade 9, goes up a little in 10th and a lot in 11th
Parent 2: Grade 9 is manageable, and Grade 11 is “insane” depending on course selection

Sidwell
Parent 1, child 1: Took hardest courses available, 2 hours per night, plus free periods. Fast, efficient worker, happy to do “good enough” job.
Parent 1, child 2: “Much longer”

Parent 2: Sidwell Junior, home by 7 or 8, works until 1 a.m.

St. Albans
Handbook says 1 hour per night per course. But parent says new block scheduling allows for up to 65 minutes free per day, and the secret to doing well is to take advantage of all the free time during the day. No reports on actual hours spent on homework from any STA parent.

NCS
Handbook says there's a limit of 42 minutes per class per night = 210 minutes for 5 classes = 3.5 hours

Holton
Grade 9, 1.5-2 hours per night, plus 1 hour per day in school

Mystery school
Freshman year – 3.5 hours; soph – 4.5 hours; junior – 6 hours sometimes; senior – back to 4 hours per night

Public School
2 hours in Grade 9, 3 in Grade 10

Mystery Big 3 school
Same parent as Public School - 50 percent more work than public school child, some kids up until 11 or 12 starting in freshman year

I'd be interested in hearing some more hard numbers from parents, attaching amounts to schools. I feel like people are shying away from conceding that a lot of us have kids cranking out homework for 3 or 4 hours almost every night.

FYI, you may have missed the part about NCS/St. Albans not having 5 classes per day because of their schedule . A student taking 5 classes has a cycle of 25 classes over 7 days -- basically 3 or 4 per day (or 3.6 if you average it). Using the NCS total of minutes, that would be 126 minutes for a 3 class day (2 hours) or 168 minutes for a 4 class day (2 hours, 45 minutes). Obviously kids might spend more. But it makes a big difference if you have 3 or 4 of your 5 classes on a day, not all 5 every day.

SJC 4+ a night, depends on whether you're taking AP and honors classes. You get hw for just about all subjects every night in 7+ classes...

Anonymous wrote:In this entire thread, I've only read 8 or 9 actual answers to the question. Here's what I've culled:

GDS
Parent 1: 2-3 hours in Grade 9, goes up a little in 10th and a lot in 11th
Parent 2: Grade 9 is manageable, and Grade 11 is “insane” depending on course selection

Sidwell
Parent 1, child 1: Took hardest courses available, 2 hours per night, plus free periods. Fast, efficient worker, happy to do “good enough” job.
Parent 1, child 2: “Much longer”

Parent 2: Sidwell Junior, home by 7 or 8, works until 1 a.m.

St. Albans
Handbook says 1 hour per night per course. But parent says new block scheduling allows for up to 65 minutes free per day, and the secret to doing well is to take advantage of all the free time during the day. No reports on actual hours spent on homework from any STA parent.

NCS
Handbook says there's a limit of 42 minutes per class per night = 210 minutes for 5 classes = 3.5 hours

Holton
Grade 9, 1.5-2 hours per night, plus 1 hour per day in school

Mystery school
Freshman year – 3.5 hours; soph – 4.5 hours; junior – 6 hours sometimes; senior – back to 4 hours per night

Public School
2 hours in Grade 9, 3 in Grade 10

Mystery Big 3 school
Same parent as Public School - 50 percent more work than public school child, some kids up until 11 or 12 starting in freshman year

I'd be interested in hearing some more hard numbers from parents, attaching amounts to schools. I feel like people are shying away from conceding that a lot of us have kids cranking out homework for 3 or 4 hours almost every night.

Thank you for summarizing.

In this entire thread, I've only read 8 or 9 actual answers to the question. Here's what I've culled:

GDS
Parent 1: 2-3 hours in Grade 9, goes up a little in 10th and a lot in 11th
Parent 2: Grade 9 is manageable, and Grade 11 is “insane” depending on course selection

Sidwell
Parent 1, child 1: Took hardest courses available, 2 hours per night, plus free periods. Fast, efficient worker, happy to do “good enough” job.
Parent 1, child 2: “Much longer”

Parent 2: Sidwell Junior, home by 7 or 8, works until 1 a.m.

St. Albans
Handbook says 1 hour per night per course. But parent says new block scheduling allows for up to 65 minutes free per day, and the secret to doing well is to take advantage of all the free time during the day. No reports on actual hours spent on homework from any STA parent.

NCS
Handbook says there's a limit of 42 minutes per class per night = 210 minutes for 5 classes = 3.5 hours

Holton
Grade 9, 1.5-2 hours per night, plus 1 hour per day in school

Mystery school
Freshman year – 3.5 hours; soph – 4.5 hours; junior – 6 hours sometimes; senior – back to 4 hours per night

Public School
2 hours in Grade 9, 3 in Grade 10

Mystery Big 3 school
Same parent as Public School - 50 percent more work than public school child, some kids up until 11 or 12 starting in freshman year

I'd be interested in hearing some more hard numbers from parents, attaching amounts to schools. I feel like people are shying away from conceding that a lot of us have kids cranking out homework for 3 or 4 hours almost every night.

The amount of homework can end up the same at two different schools depending on the classes and teachers he gets at each grade level. If he's not afraid of the challenge at the more academic school, let him try. He can always transfer to less rigorous. Also, so many of these kids are elite middle school athletes who want to play multiple sports and then when they get to high school, things can change in terms of how much time they want to spend on multiple sports...it's not just juggling the homework, also consider interest in clubs and other ECs, social life. And as they start to play against essentially grown men and women on the varsity teams, you see more injuries. And there's the whole body type consideration colleges recruit for. Read the string of emails that started about Sidwell vs St Albans in this forum and then moved to the Older Teens forum.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:@23:22, that's a great post about how much more time sports take. I was a three-sport high school athlete and played two sports in college, Division I. I would have happily played club sports in my fall/spring sports (the ones I ended up playing in college), but clubs didn't exist at that point.

So my time commitment was limited to in-season, my own training, and camps in summer. No extra club practices on top of school practice or three-day weekend showcase tournaments. It has really changed the landscape.

This is a real concern for us. Our 8th grader plays a club sport at the elite level and wants to play two sports in HS. DS was accepted at two private HSs -- one a very academically challenging/prestigous HS that we understand has a very heavy homework load and the other a less academically rigorous HS in a more competitive sports league. We have suggested to our DS that he may have a happier HS life, and end up in the same position for college admissions, choosing the school with more competitive sports but less daily homework. We are very afraid he wont be home until 7 pm on weekdays, and will be up to 1am every night at the more academically challenging HS. We think that kind of schedule will make for an unhappy and possibly unhealthy HS life. DS is a "type A" personality however and he does not share our concerns about the homework load. We will have to figure this out this week.....

High school is difficult and demanding at any great area school (public or private), and every other Type A personality (and there are many) will be competing with your son to earn those top grades and test scores for college admissions. If your son does not mind a certain number of B+/B grades on his high school transcript, and some amount of stress -- which he may not, given that it sounds like he may be an athletic recruit -- then he may prefer the more academically rigorous and prestigious school. If he stresses out about his grades, and would prefer more A/A-, particularly with the intense time demands of an elite, club-level sport (swimming) and two additional high school sports, then he might do best at the less demanding high school, that in any case best supports his athletic talents.

Anonymous wrote:@23:22, that's a great post about how much more time sports take. I was a three-sport high school athlete and played two sports in college, Division I. I would have happily played club sports in my fall/spring sports (the ones I ended up playing in college), but clubs didn't exist at that point.

So my time commitment was limited to in-season, my own training, and camps in summer. No extra club practices on top of school practice or three-day weekend showcase tournaments. It has really changed the landscape.

This is a real concern for us. Our 8th grader plays a club sport at the elite level and wants to play two sports in HS. DS was accepted at two private HSs -- one a very academically challenging/prestigous HS that we understand has a very heavy homework load and the other a less academically rigorous HS in a more competitive sports league. We have suggested to our DS that he may have a happier HS life, and end up in the same position for college admissions, choosing the school with more competitive sports but less daily homework. We are very afraid he wont be home until 7 pm on weekdays, and will be up to 1am every night at the more academically challenging HS. We think that kind of schedule will make for an unhappy and possibly unhealthy HS life. DS is a "type A" personality however and he does not share our concerns about the homework load. We will have to figure this out this week.....

@23:22, that's a great post about how much more time sports take. I was a three-sport high school athlete and played two sports in college, Division I. I would have happily played club sports in my fall/spring sports (the ones I ended up playing in college), but clubs didn't exist at that point.

So my time commitment was limited to in-season, my own training, and camps in summer. No extra club practices on top of school practice or three-day weekend showcase tournaments. It has really changed the landscape.

I went to an average Catholic high school, took honors and AP classes, and always had 3-5 hours of homework a night. I think what's different today is the activities, particularly the club sports. I played one sport, one season for my h.s., and was done w/ practice by about 5:30. Today kids don't finish sports practice until 7:00, and they're playing sports all year long. I think that's the big difference, not the amount of homework.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And I think 2 -3 hours of homework after a 7 hour school day is bullshit. What the hell are they being taught in class anyway if kids can't have a life outside the classroom. You' re not getting much value for money. Most of the crap being taught with exception of a few doesn't fit 21st century needs anyway and can learned online. I have my own curriculum for my kids, they go to school but I sweat the homework the way I used to.

1. They are not in class for seven hours. If they are using free periods the nightly homework load diminishes. Typical class time for Upper School would be 250 - 300 minutes of instruction a day (4 - 5 hours).
2. You can't have humanities classes -- papers, reading longer literary works -- without spending time at home. Theoretically it's possible for classes depending on problem solving to do more of that in the classroom.
3. In public schools no extra-curriculars are required; there are private schools with no sports requirement and a modest (say 2-3 hours per week) PE requirement; and even schools that require sports/PE generally have an option that is not time-intensive (for example, the PE option at Sidwell; Personal Fitness at NCS; intramurals at St. Albans). If your child is not doing a sport (your and their choice) they will have even more time for homework. And does your child do a club sport? Why is 4 hours a day of soccer (school plus club practice) more important than 2 hours of homework?
4. You can home school.

Bottom line, the American secondary school model includes homework. It hasn't really expanded over 25 years, either -- kids are taking longer to do it, by and large, because of interruptions (texting, YouTube, etc). There are some options if you don't like it, but you can't expect to apply to a prestigious school that has a significant amount of homework and then demand that they change their educational model.

New poster here - I have no issues with any of your comments (in fact they are mostly spot on) but I would not say this statement is necessarily true - I never had nearly as much homework as kids have today. It wasn't even close.

I don't know . . . I know some teachers at top private schools that are alums of the private schools at which they now teach, and they believe the workload is very comparable. But maybe there's more pressure to take AP classes and such. They do all say that the distractions have multiplied exponentially, however.

Anonymous wrote:And I think 2 -3 hours of homework after a 7 hour school day is bullshit. What the hell are they being taught in class anyway if kids can't have a life outside the classroom. You' re not getting much value for money. Most of the crap being taught with exception of a few doesn't fit 21st century needs anyway and can learned online. I have my own curriculum for my kids, they go to school but I sweat the homework the way I used to.

I went to a crappy public high school, took the hardest classes available and did about 4-5 hours of homework a night. It was busy and stressful but it was OK in the long run.

The key to a balanced experience at STA is for upper school students to use free periods wisely. These boys can have it all good grades, sports, performing arts and a social weekend.