Toward the beginning of the year, a typical student feels refreshed and well-rested for the upcoming school year, having caught up on sleep during summer break. The school year begins and without even realizing it, students find themselves delving deeper into classes, clubs, sports and every other little thing that limits sleep at night. Soon, they go to bed at an unhealthy hour and can barely stay awake in classes.

People sleep for a variety of reasons: to recover from the difficulties of the day, to process and encode information and, according to superstition, to maybe even keep everyone safe from the night. Nonetheless, sleep is crucial. Getting a full seven to nine hours of sleep at night is recommended, yet sleep seems to escape many teenagers.

“I get anywhere from six to eight hours of sleep on a typical school night,” sophomore Kaitlin Molloy said. “Extracurriculars can take around two and a half hours everyday. That pushes my homework schedule back so I don’t have as much time and then I go to bed later.”

It is no secret that high school can be quite demanding, and sleep often ranks low on the list of importance to the hardworking youth of Northern Virginia.

“It’s not so much about the amount of homework that I receive; it’s more if I have theater practice or some other after school activity,” junior Alexander Yee said. “As we get closer to a show in theater, I’ll get home at around eight or 10 and then do my homework. After homework, I’ll go to sleep around 11 and get six or seven hours of sleep.”

Schedules and free time obviously vary between each student. Athletes might find themselves sleeping very little due to practices and games. Add homework on top of that and the thought of getting a healthy amount of sleep becomes a hopeless reality. Even without a busy schedule, the average student will frequently lose out on the recommended hours of sleep due to school work alone.

“There is a lot of homework from every single class, and I like to put my full effort toward all my classes,” junior Javeria Zulfqar said. “All of that adds up to a lot of work, which takes hours to do every single day, which causes me to go to bed really late.”

The solution is simple: make time for sleep. It may be difficult to get a full eight hours of sleep at night, but it is entirely rewarding. Work hard and sleep even harder.