The Day I Stopped Talking and Started Listening to My Students

Today my AP Lit seniors entered my classroom exhausted, sick, or both. We stared at each other for a few minutes. As the mother of two teens and a high school teacher, I witness firsthand the effects on students of our testing culture, our early start times, our competitive roads to higher education.

Mariah entered class with bags under her eyes, and slumped shoulders. She was exhausted from having worked until 11 pm the night before. Erick, our student body president, was still recovering f...