The homework slide, beginning at least since the early ‘90s, has accelerated in recent years, according an Education Week article citing Monitoring the Future, an ongoing national research project that tracks behaviors of teens and others.
In 2023, 8th graders averaged 36 minutes of homework daily, down 17% from 2021; 10th graders spent on average 47 minutes daily in 2023, down from 60 minutes in 2021. Also in 2023, “no homeworkers” reached a peak: 15% of 8th graders and 10.8% of 10th graders reported doing no homework that year.
“I think post-pandemic, there’s been a lot more pushing back on the idea of working hard, period,” says Jean Twenge, a professor of psychology at San Diego University.
Doing less homework may be symptomatic of students’ declining motivation, which is part of a broad cultural shift that accelerated during and after the pandemic, suggest experts. For instance, an EdWeek Research Center survey reported that a significant percentage of high school students were experiencing more school-related problems than pre-pandemic levels: 74% of those surveyed said students procrastinated more, 65% reported worse or incomplete grades, and 56% noted less class participation.
Other surveys note persistent increases in student misbehavior and disengagement. These issues are not limited to education. Many adult employees appear to be having motivational issues on the job. And the factors blamed for low employee morale may be similar to those that demotivate students.
For example, a 2023 poll by the Wall Street Journal and NORC, a nonpartisan research group at the University of Chicago, found 67% of respondents agreed that hard work was “very important” to them—down from 83% in 1998.
There are other signs of negative employee attitudes post-pandemic. Findings from a national Gallup survey of U.S. employees showed that employee engagement began to fall in 2021 and reached a 10-year low in 2024, when only 31% of U.S. employees reported being “actively engaged” in work and 17% reported being actively “disengaged.”
These findings are representative of the workplace trend called “quiet quitting.” It’s characterized by workplace behavior where employees do as little as possible on the job. Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workplace report indicated that “quiet quitters” made up 59% of the total global workforce. This behavior is also known as “presentism.” Individuals show up for work, are present, but are not engaged.
The latest Gallup data found a strong correlation between morale and employees’ feelings of being engaged. Only 30% of employees reported feeling connected to their company’s mission and purpose, according to the January 2025 survey. Related data published in August found a minority of U.S. employees—23%—believe that their organization cares about their well-being.
Students, like adults, report working harder when they have a positive connection—in their case, to school and especially with a teacher or other staff member.
“When there’s a teacher that I have a relationship with, I—100%—try harder in class. Even if I got no sleep the night before, I’ll stay up for first period because I like the teacher,” Warren Coates, a then-senior at Smyrna High School in central Delaware, told Education Week in the fall of 2024.
Michael C. Reichert, a psychologist and executive director of the Center for the Study of Boys’ and Girls’ Lives at the University of Pennsylvania, believes all students, especially boys, are relational learners — they learn best when they have a positive relationship with their teachers. Multiple studies in diverse school settings support this assertion.
Reichert has developed “relational gestures” to help teachers initiate and maintain positive learning relationships with students. These gestures include proactively engaging with students to show interest in them beyond who they are in the classroom.
Antoine Germany, an assistant principal at Luther Burbank High School in Sacramento, Calif., suggests that teachers give students specific roles or responsibilities in class to boost engagement and effort – beyond being merely present in the classroom. He also recommends celebrating students’ work by displaying it publicly, in the classroom or hallways, for instance.
These strategies may not immediately show students doing more homework. But students—like employees—may be motivated by educators whose concerted efforts make them feel like an integral part of a community.
Education Week
