A few days into the new semester this January, LaSalle Parish schools in rural Louisiana announced a districtwide policy: no more required homework. The decision affects about 2,500 students from elementary through high school. Parents can request practice materials, Superintendent Jonathan Garrett said, but assignments won’t be mandatory or graded.
Garrett said homework had long been a major source of complaints from families and students. He described frustration over what kids bring home and parents’ struggles to help. He also said much homework—particularly in math—often feels repetitive, takes too long, and hasn’t adapted to challenges posed by generative artificial intelligence.
The reaction online was swift and largely positive: the announcement became the district’s most “liked” Facebook post this year, with many parents from neighboring areas asking how to replicate it. LaSalle’s move fits a broader pattern educators and researchers have tracked for years: a decline in homework, especially math homework, in U.S. schools.
Federal survey data show a steady drop in math homework for fourth- and eighth-graders over the past decade. Between 1996 and 2015, only 4–6 percent of fourth graders reported having no math homework the previous night; by 2024 that number rose to more than a quarter. Teachers report similar trends. An EdWeek Research Center survey found 40 percent of teachers said homework assignments had decreased over the past two years; of those, 29 percent attributed the decline to students’ use of AI, which can reduce the perceived value of take-home practice.
Research on homework’s effects is mixed and difficult to interpret. Studies must contend with wide differences in how long students take to complete tasks and why. A 2021 longitudinal study of more than 6,000 students across Germany, Uruguay and the Netherlands found lower-performing students who increased their math homework time improved their math scores even a year later. By contrast, a 1998 Duke University study of over 700 U.S. students found more elementary homework did not significantly affect standardized test scores, though there were small gains in class grades; that study also linked more homework to negative attitudes about school among younger children.
Some scholars argue math in particular requires practice. Tom Loveless, a researcher and former teacher, has said the strongest argument for homework is that procedural math skills need repetition and class time is often reserved for instruction rather than practice. Some worry that reducing homework could hurt math achievement at a time when nationwide math scores are already low.
Generative AI has added urgency to the debate. A Pew Research Center survey found more than half of teens said they’ve used chatbots to help with schoolwork, and about 1 in 10 said they used virtual assistants to do all or most of their work. Teachers and administrators are grappling with how to assign meaningful, integrity-preserving homework in that environment.
Equity concerns also shape the conversation. Ariel Taylor Smith of the National Parents Union said some schools drop homework to avoid penalizing students whose parents can’t provide support at home. But she and others point out that students who are falling far behind may need extra practice, and not all families can or will provide that. Some parents create their own practice routines—reading exercises, flash cards—to fill the gap.
Families’ experiences with homework vary. Jim Malliard of Franklin, Pa., said his children’s school-based trauma and bullying made homework a battleground at home; what teachers estimated would take 15 minutes sometimes stretched to an hour. Those stressors led his family to enroll the children in a virtual charter school.
How much homework is appropriate has been examined repeatedly, with no definitive answer. A commonly cited guideline is 10 minutes per grade level per night (so 10 minutes for first grade, 120 minutes for 12th). Yet it’s nearly impossible to assign work that takes every student the same time. Research suggests too much homework can be harmful: a 2014 Stanford study of more than 4,300 students in high-performing California high schools found benefits plateau after about two hours of homework per night; beyond that, additional homework linked to more stress and less sleep.
Experts emphasize quality over quantity. Joyce Epstein of Johns Hopkins, who has studied homework extensively, says research tends to focus on time spent, not the assignment’s purpose. She recommends homework designed with a clear objective and that is as brief as necessary to achieve that goal. In math, she suggests assignments can be targeted and shorter—students don’t need dozens of examples to establish mastery.
Some districts are adapting by assigning less homework but improving its design. Wendy Birhanzel, superintendent of Harrison School District 2 in Colorado, described moving away from long worksheets to purposeful, shorter tasks: a reading activity, a few math problems, a short writing sample. LaSalle Parish plans a similar approach but is also allowing teachers to slow down instruction and provide practice time during the school day, even if that means covering less content over the year. Garrett said he believes spending class time on practice may be more beneficial than racing through the curriculum.
The homework debate has swung back and forth over decades and will likely continue to evolve as evidence, technology and public opinion change. Research challenges—variations in students’ background, time on task, and how homework is used—make a one-size-fits-all policy difficult. Still, districts like LaSalle are experimenting with reduced homework requirements, prompting other communities to consider whether homework helps, harms, or simply needs to be rethought.
This story was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Contact writer Ariel Gilreath on Signal at arielgilreath.46 or at [email protected].