should there be homework after school

Should Kids Get Homework?

Homework gives elementary students a way to practice concepts, but too much can be harmful, experts say.

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Effective homework reinforces math, reading, writing or spelling skills, but in a way that's meaningful.

How much homework students should get has long been a source of debate among parents and educators. In recent years, some districts have even implemented no-homework policies, as students juggle sports, music and other activities after school.

Parents of elementary school students, in particular, have argued that after-school hours should be spent with family or playing outside rather than completing assignments. And there is little research to show that homework improves academic achievement for elementary students.

But some experts say there's value in homework, even for younger students. When done well, it can help students practice core concepts and develop study habits and time management skills. The key to effective homework, they say, is keeping assignments related to classroom learning, and tailoring the amount by age: Many experts suggest no homework for kindergartners, and little to none in first and second grade.

Value of Homework

Homework provides a chance to solidify what is being taught in the classroom that day, week or unit. Practice matters, says Janine Bempechat, clinical professor at Boston University 's Wheelock College of Education & Human Development.

"There really is no other domain of human ability where anybody would say you don't need to practice," she adds. "We have children practicing piano and we have children going to sports practice several days a week after school. You name the domain of ability and practice is in there."

Homework is also the place where schools and families most frequently intersect.

"The children are bringing things from the school into the home," says Paula S. Fass, professor emerita of history at the University of California—Berkeley and the author of "The End of American Childhood." "Before the pandemic, (homework) was the only real sense that parents had to what was going on in schools."

Harris Cooper, professor emeritus of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University and author of "The Battle Over Homework," examined more than 60 research studies on homework between 1987 and 2003 and found that — when designed properly — homework can lead to greater student success. Too much, however, is harmful. And homework has a greater positive effect on students in secondary school (grades 7-12) than those in elementary.

"Every child should be doing homework, but the amount and type that they're doing should be appropriate for their developmental level," he says. "For teachers, it's a balancing act. Doing away with homework completely is not in the best interest of children and families. But overburdening families with homework is also not in the child's or a family's best interest."

Negative Homework Assignments

Not all homework for elementary students involves completing a worksheet. Assignments can be fun, says Cooper, like having students visit educational locations, keep statistics on their favorite sports teams, read for pleasure or even help their parents grocery shop. The point is to show students that activities done outside of school can relate to subjects learned in the classroom.

But assignments that are just busy work, that force students to learn new concepts at home, or that are overly time-consuming can be counterproductive, experts say.

Homework that's just busy work.

Effective homework reinforces math, reading, writing or spelling skills, but in a way that's meaningful, experts say. Assignments that look more like busy work – projects or worksheets that don't require teacher feedback and aren't related to topics learned in the classroom – can be frustrating for students and create burdens for families.

"The mental health piece has definitely played a role here over the last couple of years during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the last thing we want to do is frustrate students with busy work or homework that makes no sense," says Dave Steckler, principal of Red Trail Elementary School in Mandan, North Dakota.

Homework on material that kids haven't learned yet.

With the pressure to cover all topics on standardized tests and limited time during the school day, some teachers assign homework that has not yet been taught in the classroom.

Not only does this create stress, but it also causes equity challenges. Some parents speak languages other than English or work several jobs, and they aren't able to help teach their children new concepts.

" It just becomes agony for both parents and the kids to get through this worksheet, and the goal becomes getting to the bottom of (the) worksheet with answers filled in without any understanding of what any of it matters for," says professor Susan R. Goldman, co-director of the Learning Sciences Research Institute at the University of Illinois—Chicago .

Homework that's overly time-consuming.

The standard homework guideline recommended by the National Parent Teacher Association and the National Education Association is the "10-minute rule" – 10 minutes of nightly homework per grade level. A fourth grader, for instance, would receive a total of 40 minutes of homework per night.

But this does not always happen, especially since not every student learns the same. A 2015 study published in the American Journal of Family Therapy found that primary school children actually received three times the recommended amount of homework — and that family stress increased along with the homework load.

Young children can only remain attentive for short periods, so large amounts of homework, especially lengthy projects, can negatively affect students' views on school. Some individual long-term projects – like having to build a replica city, for example – typically become an assignment for parents rather than students, Fass says.

"It's one thing to assign a project like that in which several kids are working on it together," she adds. "In (that) case, the kids do normally work on it. It's another to send it home to the families, where it becomes a burden and doesn't really accomplish very much."

Private vs. Public Schools

Do private schools assign more homework than public schools? There's little research on the issue, but experts say private school parents may be more accepting of homework, seeing it as a sign of academic rigor.

Of course, not all private schools are the same – some focus on college preparation and traditional academics, while others stress alternative approaches to education.

"I think in the academically oriented private schools, there's more support for homework from parents," says Gerald K. LeTendre, chair of educational administration at Pennsylvania State University—University Park . "I don't know if there's any research to show there's more homework, but it's less of a contentious issue."

How to Address Homework Overload

First, assess if the workload takes as long as it appears. Sometimes children may start working on a homework assignment, wander away and come back later, Cooper says.

"Parents don't see it, but they know that their child has started doing their homework four hours ago and still not done it," he adds. "They don't see that there are those four hours where their child was doing lots of other things. So the homework assignment itself actually is not four hours long. It's the way the child is approaching it."

But if homework is becoming stressful or workload is excessive, experts suggest parents first approach the teacher, followed by a school administrator.

"Many times, we can solve a lot of issues by having conversations," Steckler says, including by "sitting down, talking about the amount of homework, and what's appropriate and not appropriate."

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Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in.

It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas about workloads?

Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework. 

Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."

For starters, he says, he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.

"Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that's what a lot of homework is, it's busy work," he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. "You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18."

Mental health experts agree heavy workloads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.

Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold , says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."

"More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies," she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.

Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace , says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression. 

And for all the distress homework  can cause, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.

"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.

For older students, Kang says, homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night. 

"Most students, especially at these high achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends, from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."

Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no-homework policy while working with students abroad.

"Not having homework was something that I always admired from the French students (and) the French schools, because that was helping the students to really have the time off and really disconnect from school," she says.

The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely but to be more mindful of the type of work students take home, suggests Kang, who was a high school teacher for 10 years.

"I don't think (we) should scrap homework; I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.

The pandemic made the conversation around homework more crucial 

Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the past two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic , making heavy workloads even harder to balance.

"COVID was just a disaster in terms of the lack of structure. Everything just deteriorated," Kardaras says, pointing to an increase in cognitive issues and decrease in attention spans among students. "School acts as an anchor for a lot of children, as a stabilizing force, and that disappeared."

But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.

"We've seen adults struggling to go back to in-person work environments from remote work environments. That effect is amplified with children because children have less resources to be able to cope with those transitions than adults do," he explains.

'Get organized' ahead of back-to-school

In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."

To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."

"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized. ... Sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.

Breaking up assignments can also make things easier to tackle.

"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."

If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.

"They should tell their teachers when a homework assignment just took too much time or if it was too difficult for them to do on their own," she says. "It's good to speak up and ask those questions. Respectfully, of course, because these are your teachers. But still, I think sometimes teachers themselves need this feedback from their students."

More: Some teachers let their students sleep in class. Here's what mental health experts say.

More: Some parents are slipping young kids in for the COVID-19 vaccine, but doctors discourage the move as 'risky'

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Credit: August de Richelieu

Does homework still have value? A Johns Hopkins education expert weighs in

Joyce epstein, co-director of the center on school, family, and community partnerships, discusses why homework is essential, how to maximize its benefit to learners, and what the 'no-homework' approach gets wrong.

By Vicky Hallett

The necessity of homework has been a subject of debate since at least as far back as the 1890s, according to Joyce L. Epstein , co-director of the Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships at Johns Hopkins University. "It's always been the case that parents, kids—and sometimes teachers, too—wonder if this is just busy work," Epstein says.

But after decades of researching how to improve schools, the professor in the Johns Hopkins School of Education remains certain that homework is essential—as long as the teachers have done their homework, too. The National Network of Partnership Schools , which she founded in 1995 to advise schools and districts on ways to improve comprehensive programs of family engagement, has developed hundreds of improved homework ideas through its Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork program. For an English class, a student might interview a parent on popular hairstyles from their youth and write about the differences between then and now. Or for science class, a family could identify forms of matter over the dinner table, labeling foods as liquids or solids. These innovative and interactive assignments not only reinforce concepts from the classroom but also foster creativity, spark discussions, and boost student motivation.

"We're not trying to eliminate homework procedures, but expand and enrich them," says Epstein, who is packing this research into a forthcoming book on the purposes and designs of homework. In the meantime, the Hub couldn't wait to ask her some questions:

What kind of homework training do teachers typically get?

Future teachers and administrators really have little formal training on how to design homework before they assign it. This means that most just repeat what their teachers did, or they follow textbook suggestions at the end of units. For example, future teachers are well prepared to teach reading and literacy skills at each grade level, and they continue to learn to improve their teaching of reading in ongoing in-service education. By contrast, most receive little or no training on the purposes and designs of homework in reading or other subjects. It is really important for future teachers to receive systematic training to understand that they have the power, opportunity, and obligation to design homework with a purpose.

Why do students need more interactive homework?

If homework assignments are always the same—10 math problems, six sentences with spelling words—homework can get boring and some kids just stop doing their assignments, especially in the middle and high school years. When we've asked teachers what's the best homework you've ever had or designed, invariably we hear examples of talking with a parent or grandparent or peer to share ideas. To be clear, parents should never be asked to "teach" seventh grade science or any other subject. Rather, teachers set up the homework assignments so that the student is in charge. It's always the student's homework. But a good activity can engage parents in a fun, collaborative way. Our data show that with "good" assignments, more kids finish their work, more kids interact with a family partner, and more parents say, "I learned what's happening in the curriculum." It all works around what the youngsters are learning.

Is family engagement really that important?

At Hopkins, I am part of the Center for Social Organization of Schools , a research center that studies how to improve many aspects of education to help all students do their best in school. One thing my colleagues and I realized was that we needed to look deeply into family and community engagement. There were so few references to this topic when we started that we had to build the field of study. When children go to school, their families "attend" with them whether a teacher can "see" the parents or not. So, family engagement is ever-present in the life of a school.

My daughter's elementary school doesn't assign homework until third grade. What's your take on "no homework" policies?

There are some parents, writers, and commentators who have argued against homework, especially for very young children. They suggest that children should have time to play after school. This, of course is true, but many kindergarten kids are excited to have homework like their older siblings. If they give homework, most teachers of young children make assignments very short—often following an informal rule of 10 minutes per grade level. "No homework" does not guarantee that all students will spend their free time in productive and imaginative play.

Some researchers and critics have consistently misinterpreted research findings. They have argued that homework should be assigned only at the high school level where data point to a strong connection of doing assignments with higher student achievement . However, as we discussed, some students stop doing homework. This leads, statistically, to results showing that doing homework or spending more minutes on homework is linked to higher student achievement. If slow or struggling students are not doing their assignments, they contribute to—or cause—this "result."

Teachers need to design homework that even struggling students want to do because it is interesting. Just about all students at any age level react positively to good assignments and will tell you so.

Did COVID change how schools and parents view homework?

Within 24 hours of the day school doors closed in March 2020, just about every school and district in the country figured out that teachers had to talk to and work with students' parents. This was not the same as homeschooling—teachers were still working hard to provide daily lessons. But if a child was learning at home in the living room, parents were more aware of what they were doing in school. One of the silver linings of COVID was that teachers reported that they gained a better understanding of their students' families. We collected wonderfully creative examples of activities from members of the National Network of Partnership Schools. I'm thinking of one art activity where every child talked with a parent about something that made their family unique. Then they drew their finding on a snowflake and returned it to share in class. In math, students talked with a parent about something the family liked so much that they could represent it 100 times. Conversations about schoolwork at home was the point.

How did you create so many homework activities via the Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork program?

We had several projects with educators to help them design interactive assignments, not just "do the next three examples on page 38." Teachers worked in teams to create TIPS activities, and then we turned their work into a standard TIPS format in math, reading/language arts, and science for grades K-8. Any teacher can use or adapt our prototypes to match their curricula.

Overall, we know that if future teachers and practicing educators were prepared to design homework assignments to meet specific purposes—including but not limited to interactive activities—more students would benefit from the important experience of doing their homework. And more parents would, indeed, be partners in education.

Posted in Voices+Opinion

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Does homework really work?

by: Leslie Crawford | Updated: December 12, 2023

Print article

You know the drill. It’s 10:15 p.m., and the cardboard-and-toothpick Golden Gate Bridge is collapsing. The pages of polynomials have been abandoned. The paper on the Battle of Waterloo seems to have frozen in time with Napoleon lingering eternally over his breakfast at Le Caillou. Then come the tears and tantrums — while we parents wonder, Does the gain merit all this pain? Is this just too much homework?

However the drama unfolds night after night, year after year, most parents hold on to the hope that homework (after soccer games, dinner, flute practice, and, oh yes, that childhood pastime of yore known as playing) advances their children academically.

But what does homework really do for kids? Is the forest’s worth of book reports and math and spelling sheets the average American student completes in their 12 years of primary schooling making a difference? Or is it just busywork?

Homework haterz

Whether or not homework helps, or even hurts, depends on who you ask. If you ask my 12-year-old son, Sam, he’ll say, “Homework doesn’t help anything. It makes kids stressed-out and tired and makes them hate school more.”

Nothing more than common kid bellyaching?

Maybe, but in the fractious field of homework studies, it’s worth noting that Sam’s sentiments nicely synopsize one side of the ivory tower debate. Books like The End of Homework , The Homework Myth , and The Case Against Homework the film Race to Nowhere , and the anguished parent essay “ My Daughter’s Homework is Killing Me ” make the case that homework, by taking away precious family time and putting kids under unneeded pressure, is an ineffective way to help children become better learners and thinkers.

One Canadian couple took their homework apostasy all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. After arguing that there was no evidence that it improved academic performance, they won a ruling that exempted their two children from all homework.

So what’s the real relationship between homework and academic achievement?

How much is too much?

To answer this question, researchers have been doing their homework on homework, conducting and examining hundreds of studies. Chris Drew Ph.D., founder and editor at The Helpful Professor recently compiled multiple statistics revealing the folly of today’s after-school busy work. Does any of the data he listed below ring true for you?

• 45 percent of parents think homework is too easy for their child, primarily because it is geared to the lowest standard under the Common Core State Standards .

• 74 percent of students say homework is a source of stress , defined as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss, and stomach problems.

• Students in high-performing high schools spend an average of 3.1 hours a night on homework , even though 1 to 2 hours is the optimal duration, according to a peer-reviewed study .

Not included in the list above is the fact many kids have to abandon activities they love — like sports and clubs — because homework deprives them of the needed time to enjoy themselves with other pursuits.

Conversely, The Helpful Professor does list a few pros of homework, noting it teaches discipline and time management, and helps parents know what’s being taught in the class.

The oft-bandied rule on homework quantity — 10 minutes a night per grade (starting from between 10 to 20 minutes in first grade) — is listed on the National Education Association’s website and the National Parent Teacher Association’s website , but few schools follow this rule.

Do you think your child is doing excessive homework? Harris Cooper Ph.D., author of a meta-study on homework , recommends talking with the teacher. “Often there is a miscommunication about the goals of homework assignments,” he says. “What appears to be problematic for kids, why they are doing an assignment, can be cleared up with a conversation.” Also, Cooper suggests taking a careful look at how your child is doing the assignments. It may seem like they’re taking two hours, but maybe your child is wandering off frequently to get a snack or getting distracted.

Less is often more

If your child is dutifully doing their work but still burning the midnight oil, it’s worth intervening to make sure your child gets enough sleep. A 2012 study of 535 high school students found that proper sleep may be far more essential to brain and body development.

For elementary school-age children, Cooper’s research at Duke University shows there is no measurable academic advantage to homework. For middle-schoolers, Cooper found there is a direct correlation between homework and achievement if assignments last between one to two hours per night. After two hours, however, achievement doesn’t improve. For high schoolers, Cooper’s research suggests that two hours per night is optimal. If teens have more than two hours of homework a night, their academic success flatlines. But less is not better. The average high school student doing homework outperformed 69 percent of the students in a class with no homework.

Many schools are starting to act on this research. A Florida superintendent abolished homework in her 42,000 student district, replacing it with 20 minutes of nightly reading. She attributed her decision to “ solid research about what works best in improving academic achievement in students .”

More family time

A 2020 survey by Crayola Experience reports 82 percent of children complain they don’t have enough quality time with their parents. Homework deserves much of the blame. “Kids should have a chance to just be kids and do things they enjoy, particularly after spending six hours a day in school,” says Alfie Kohn, author of The Homework Myth . “It’s absurd to insist that children must be engaged in constructive activities right up until their heads hit the pillow.”

By far, the best replacement for homework — for both parents and children — is bonding, relaxing time together.

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Are You Down With or Done With Homework?

• Posted January 17, 2012
• By Lory Hough

The debate over how much schoolwork students should be doing at home has flared again, with one side saying it's too much, the other side saying in our competitive world, it's just not enough.

It was a move that doesn't happen very often in American public schools: The principal got rid of homework.

This past September, Stephanie Brant, principal of Gaithersburg Elementary School in Gaithersburg, Md., decided that instead of teachers sending kids home with math worksheets and spelling flash cards, students would instead go home and read. Every day for 30 minutes, more if they had time or the inclination, with parents or on their own.

"I knew this would be a big shift for my community," she says. But she also strongly believed it was a necessary one. Twenty-first-century learners, especially those in elementary school, need to think critically and understand their own learning — not spend night after night doing rote homework drills.

Brant's move may not be common, but she isn't alone in her questioning. The value of doing schoolwork at home has gone in and out of fashion in the United States among educators, policymakers, the media, and, more recently, parents. As far back as the late 1800s, with the rise of the Progressive Era, doctors such as Joseph Mayer Rice began pushing for a limit on what he called "mechanical homework," saying it caused childhood nervous conditions and eyestrain. Around that time, the then-influential Ladies Home Journal began publishing a series of anti-homework articles, stating that five hours of brain work a day was "the most we should ask of our children," and that homework was an intrusion on family life. In response, states like California passed laws abolishing homework for students under a certain age.

But, as is often the case with education, the tide eventually turned. After the Russians launched the Sputnik satellite in 1957, a space race emerged, and, writes Brian Gill in the journal Theory Into Practice, "The homework problem was reconceived as part of a national crisis; the U.S. was losing the Cold War because Russian children were smarter." Many earlier laws limiting homework were abolished, and the longterm trend toward less homework came to an end.

The debate re-emerged a decade later when parents of the late '60s and '70s argued that children should be free to play and explore — similar anti-homework wellness arguments echoed nearly a century earlier. By the early-1980s, however, the pendulum swung again with the publication of A Nation at Risk , which blamed poor education for a "rising tide of mediocrity." Students needed to work harder, the report said, and one way to do this was more homework.

For the most part, this pro-homework sentiment is still going strong today, in part because of mandatory testing and continued economic concerns about the nation's competitiveness. Many believe that today's students are falling behind their peers in places like Korea and Finland and are paying more attention to Angry Birds than to ancient Babylonia.

But there are also a growing number of Stephanie Brants out there, educators and parents who believe that students are stressed and missing out on valuable family time. Students, they say, particularly younger students who have seen a rise in the amount of take-home work and already put in a six- to nine-hour "work" day, need less, not more homework.

Who is right? Are students not working hard enough or is homework not working for them? Here's where the story gets a little tricky: It depends on whom you ask and what research you're looking at. As Cathy Vatterott, the author of Rethinking Homework , points out, "Homework has generated enough research so that a study can be found to support almost any position, as long as conflicting studies are ignored." Alfie Kohn, author of The Homework Myth and a strong believer in eliminating all homework, writes that, "The fact that there isn't anything close to unanimity among experts belies the widespread assumption that homework helps." At best, he says, homework shows only an association, not a causal relationship, with academic achievement. In other words, it's hard to tease out how homework is really affecting test scores and grades. Did one teacher give better homework than another? Was one teacher more effective in the classroom? Do certain students test better or just try harder?

"It is difficult to separate where the effect of classroom teaching ends," Vatterott writes, "and the effect of homework begins."

Putting research aside, however, much of the current debate over homework is focused less on how homework affects academic achievement and more on time. Parents in particular have been saying that the amount of time children spend in school, especially with afterschool programs, combined with the amount of homework given — as early as kindergarten — is leaving students with little time to run around, eat dinner with their families, or even get enough sleep.

Certainly, for some parents, homework is a way to stay connected to their children's learning. But for others, homework creates a tug-of-war between parents and children, says Liz Goodenough, M.A.T.'71, creator of a documentary called Where Do the Children Play?

"Ideally homework should be about taking something home, spending a few curious and interesting moments in which children might engage with parents, and then getting that project back to school — an organizational triumph," she says. "A nag-free activity could engage family time: Ask a parent about his or her own childhood. Interview siblings."

Instead, as the authors of The Case Against Homework write, "Homework overload is turning many of us into the types of parents we never wanted to be: nags, bribers, and taskmasters."

Leslie Butchko saw it happen a few years ago when her son started sixth grade in the Santa Monica-Malibu (Calif.) United School District. She remembers him getting two to four hours of homework a night, plus weekend and vacation projects. He was overwhelmed and struggled to finish assignments, especially on nights when he also had an extracurricular activity.

"Ultimately, we felt compelled to have Bobby quit karate — he's a black belt — to allow more time for homework," she says. And then, with all of their attention focused on Bobby's homework, she and her husband started sending their youngest to his room so that Bobby could focus. "One day, my younger son gave us 15-minute coupons as a present for us to use to send him to play in the back room. … It was then that we realized there had to be something wrong with the amount of homework we were facing."

Butchko joined forces with another mother who was having similar struggles and ultimately helped get the homework policy in her district changed, limiting homework on weekends and holidays, setting time guidelines for daily homework, and broadening the definition of homework to include projects and studying for tests. As she told the school board at one meeting when the policy was first being discussed, "In closing, I just want to say that I had more free time at Harvard Law School than my son has in middle school, and that is not in the best interests of our children."

One barrier that Butchko had to overcome initially was convincing many teachers and parents that more homework doesn't necessarily equal rigor.

"Most of the parents that were against the homework policy felt that students need a large quantity of homework to prepare them for the rigorous AP classes in high school and to get them into Harvard," she says.

Stephanie Conklin, Ed.M.'06, sees this at Another Course to College, the Boston pilot school where she teaches math. "When a student is not completing [his or her] homework, parents usually are frustrated by this and agree with me that homework is an important part of their child's learning," she says.

As Timothy Jarman, Ed.M.'10, a ninth-grade English teacher at Eugene Ashley High School in Wilmington, N.C., says, "Parents think it is strange when their children are not assigned a substantial amount of homework."

That's because, writes Vatterott, in her chapter, "The Cult(ure) of Homework," the concept of homework "has become so engrained in U.S. culture that the word homework is part of the common vernacular."

These days, nightly homework is a given in American schools, writes Kohn.

"Homework isn't limited to those occasions when it seems appropriate and important. Most teachers and administrators aren't saying, 'It may be useful to do this particular project at home,'" he writes. "Rather, the point of departure seems to be, 'We've decided ahead of time that children will have to do something every night (or several times a week). … This commitment to the idea of homework in the abstract is accepted by the overwhelming majority of schools — public and private, elementary and secondary."

Brant had to confront this when she cut homework at Gaithersburg Elementary.

"A lot of my parents have this idea that homework is part of life. This is what I had to do when I was young," she says, and so, too, will our kids. "So I had to shift their thinking." She did this slowly, first by asking her teachers last year to really think about what they were sending home. And this year, in addition to forming a parent advisory group around the issue, she also holds events to answer questions.

Still, not everyone is convinced that homework as a given is a bad thing. "Any pursuit of excellence, be it in sports, the arts, or academics, requires hard work. That our culture finds it okay for kids to spend hours a day in a sport but not equal time on academics is part of the problem," wrote one pro-homework parent on the blog for the documentary Race to Nowhere , which looks at the stress American students are under. "Homework has always been an issue for parents and children. It is now and it was 20 years ago. I think when people decide to have children that it is their responsibility to educate them," wrote another.

And part of educating them, some believe, is helping them develop skills they will eventually need in adulthood. "Homework can help students develop study skills that will be of value even after they leave school," reads a publication on the U.S. Department of Education website called Homework Tips for Parents. "It can teach them that learning takes place anywhere, not just in the classroom. … It can foster positive character traits such as independence and responsibility. Homework can teach children how to manage time."

Annie Brown, Ed.M.'01, feels this is particularly critical at less affluent schools like the ones she has worked at in Boston, Cambridge, Mass., and Los Angeles as a literacy coach.

"It feels important that my students do homework because they will ultimately be competing for college placement and jobs with students who have done homework and have developed a work ethic," she says. "Also it will get them ready for independently taking responsibility for their learning, which will need to happen for them to go to college."

The problem with this thinking, writes Vatterott, is that homework becomes a way to practice being a worker.

"Which begs the question," she writes. "Is our job as educators to produce learners or workers?"

Slate magazine editor Emily Bazelon, in a piece about homework, says this makes no sense for younger kids.

"Why should we think that practicing homework in first grade will make you better at doing it in middle school?" she writes. "Doesn't the opposite seem equally plausible: that it's counterproductive to ask children to sit down and work at night before they're developmentally ready because you'll just make them tired and cross?"

Kohn writes in the American School Board Journal that this "premature exposure" to practices like homework (and sit-and-listen lessons and tests) "are clearly a bad match for younger children and of questionable value at any age." He calls it BGUTI: Better Get Used to It. "The logic here is that we have to prepare you for the bad things that are going to be done to you later … by doing them to you now."

According to a recent University of Michigan study, daily homework for six- to eight-year-olds increased on average from about 8 minutes in 1981 to 22 minutes in 2003. A review of research by Duke University Professor Harris Cooper found that for elementary school students, "the average correlation between time spent on homework and achievement … hovered around zero."

So should homework be eliminated? Of course not, say many Ed School graduates who are teaching. Not only would students not have time for essays and long projects, but also teachers would not be able to get all students to grade level or to cover critical material, says Brett Pangburn, Ed.M.'06, a sixth-grade English teacher at Excel Academy Charter School in Boston. Still, he says, homework has to be relevant.

"Kids need to practice the skills being taught in class, especially where, like the kids I teach at Excel, they are behind and need to catch up," he says. "Our results at Excel have demonstrated that kids can catch up and view themselves as in control of their academic futures, but this requires hard work, and homework is a part of it."

Ed School Professor Howard Gardner basically agrees.

"America and Americans lurch between too little homework in many of our schools to an excess of homework in our most competitive environments — Li'l Abner vs. Tiger Mother," he says. "Neither approach makes sense. Homework should build on what happens in class, consolidating skills and helping students to answer new questions."

So how can schools come to a happy medium, a way that allows teachers to cover everything they need while not overwhelming students? Conklin says she often gives online math assignments that act as labs and students have two or three days to complete them, including some in-class time. Students at Pangburn's school have a 50-minute silent period during regular school hours where homework can be started, and where teachers pull individual or small groups of students aside for tutoring, often on that night's homework. Afterschool homework clubs can help.

Some schools and districts have adapted time limits rather than nix homework completely, with the 10-minute per grade rule being the standard — 10 minutes a night for first-graders, 30 minutes for third-graders, and so on. (This remedy, however, is often met with mixed results since not all students work at the same pace.) Other schools offer an extended day that allows teachers to cover more material in school, in turn requiring fewer take-home assignments. And for others, like Stephanie Brant's elementary school in Maryland, more reading with a few targeted project assignments has been the answer.

"The routine of reading is so much more important than the routine of homework," she says. "Let's have kids reflect. You can still have the routine and you can still have your workspace, but now it's for reading. I often say to parents, if we can put a man on the moon, we can put a man or woman on Mars and that person is now a second-grader. We don't know what skills that person will need. At the end of the day, we have to feel confident that we're giving them something they can use on Mars."

Read a January 2014 update.

Homework Policy Still Going Strong

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What’s the Right Amount of Homework?

Decades of research show that homework has some benefits, especially for students in middle and high school—but there are risks to assigning too much.

Many teachers and parents believe that homework helps students build study skills and review concepts learned in class. Others see homework as disruptive and unnecessary, leading to burnout and turning kids off to school. Decades of research show that the issue is more nuanced and complex than most people think: Homework is beneficial, but only to a degree. Students in high school gain the most, while younger kids benefit much less.

The National PTA and the National Education Association support the “ 10-minute homework guideline ”—a nightly 10 minutes of homework per grade level. But many teachers and parents are quick to point out that what matters is the quality of the homework assigned and how well it meets students’ needs, not the amount of time spent on it.

The guideline doesn’t account for students who may need to spend more—or less—time on assignments. In class, teachers can make adjustments to support struggling students, but at home, an assignment that takes one student 30 minutes to complete may take another twice as much time—often for reasons beyond their control. And homework can widen the achievement gap, putting students from low-income households and students with learning disabilities at a disadvantage.

However, the 10-minute guideline is useful in setting a limit: When kids spend too much time on homework, there are real consequences to consider.

Small Benefits for Elementary Students

As young children begin school, the focus should be on cultivating a love of learning, and assigning too much homework can undermine that goal. And young students often don’t have the study skills to benefit fully from homework, so it may be a poor use of time (Cooper, 1989 ; Cooper et al., 2006 ; Marzano & Pickering, 2007 ). A more effective activity may be nightly reading, especially if parents are involved. The benefits of reading are clear: If students aren’t proficient readers by the end of third grade, they’re less likely to succeed academically and graduate from high school (Fiester, 2013 ).

For second-grade teacher Jacqueline Fiorentino, the minor benefits of homework did not outweigh the potential drawback of turning young children against school at an early age, so she experimented with dropping mandatory homework. “Something surprising happened: They started doing more work at home,” Fiorentino writes . “This inspiring group of 8-year-olds used their newfound free time to explore subjects and topics of interest to them.” She encouraged her students to read at home and offered optional homework to extend classroom lessons and help them review material.

Moderate Benefits for Middle School Students

As students mature and develop the study skills necessary to delve deeply into a topic—and to retain what they learn—they also benefit more from homework. Nightly assignments can help prepare them for scholarly work, and research shows that homework can have moderate benefits for middle school students (Cooper et al., 2006 ). Recent research also shows that online math homework, which can be designed to adapt to students’ levels of understanding, can significantly boost test scores (Roschelle et al., 2016 ).

There are risks to assigning too much, however: A 2015 study found that when middle school students were assigned more than 90 to 100 minutes of daily homework, their math and science test scores began to decline (Fernández-Alonso, Suárez-Álvarez, & Muñiz, 2015 ). Crossing that upper limit can drain student motivation and focus. The researchers recommend that “homework should present a certain level of challenge or difficulty, without being so challenging that it discourages effort.” Teachers should avoid low-effort, repetitive assignments, and assign homework “with the aim of instilling work habits and promoting autonomous, self-directed learning.”

In other words, it’s the quality of homework that matters, not the quantity. Brian Sztabnik, a veteran middle and high school English teacher, suggests that teachers take a step back and ask themselves these five questions :

• How long will it take to complete?
• Have all learners been considered?
• Will an assignment encourage future success?
• Will an assignment place material in a context the classroom cannot?
• Does an assignment offer support when a teacher is not there?

More Benefits for High School Students, but Risks as Well

By the time they reach high school, students should be well on their way to becoming independent learners, so homework does provide a boost to learning at this age, as long as it isn’t overwhelming (Cooper et al., 2006 ; Marzano & Pickering, 2007 ). When students spend too much time on homework—more than two hours each night—it takes up valuable time to rest and spend time with family and friends. A 2013 study found that high school students can experience serious mental and physical health problems, from higher stress levels to sleep deprivation, when assigned too much homework (Galloway, Conner, & Pope, 2013 ).

Homework in high school should always relate to the lesson and be doable without any assistance, and feedback should be clear and explicit.

Teachers should also keep in mind that not all students have equal opportunities to finish their homework at home, so incomplete homework may not be a true reflection of their learning—it may be more a result of issues they face outside of school. They may be hindered by issues such as lack of a quiet space at home, resources such as a computer or broadband connectivity, or parental support (OECD, 2014 ). In such cases, giving low homework scores may be unfair.

Since the quantities of time discussed here are totals, teachers in middle and high school should be aware of how much homework other teachers are assigning. It may seem reasonable to assign 30 minutes of daily homework, but across six subjects, that’s three hours—far above a reasonable amount even for a high school senior. Psychologist Maurice Elias sees this as a common mistake: Individual teachers create homework policies that in aggregate can overwhelm students. He suggests that teachers work together to develop a school-wide homework policy and make it a key topic of back-to-school night and the first parent-teacher conferences of the school year.

Parents Play a Key Role

Homework can be a powerful tool to help parents become more involved in their child’s learning (Walker et al., 2004 ). It can provide insights into a child’s strengths and interests, and can also encourage conversations about a child’s life at school. If a parent has positive attitudes toward homework, their children are more likely to share those same values, promoting academic success.

But it’s also possible for parents to be overbearing, putting too much emphasis on test scores or grades, which can be disruptive for children (Madjar, Shklar, & Moshe, 2015 ). Parents should avoid being overly intrusive or controlling—students report feeling less motivated to learn when they don’t have enough space and autonomy to do their homework (Orkin, May, & Wolf, 2017 ; Patall, Cooper, & Robinson, 2008 ; Silinskas & Kikas, 2017 ). So while homework can encourage parents to be more involved with their kids, it’s important to not make it a source of conflict.

clock This article was published more than  1 year ago

A deep dive into whether -- and how -- homework should be graded

Homework has been a source of contention since it was first assigned in U.S. public schools in the 1800s. By 1900, it had become so unpopular in some circles that an editorial by Edward Bok, the influential editor of the Ladies’ Home Journal, had this headline: “A National Crime at the Feet of American Parents.”

“The child is made to study far, far beyond his physical strength, and consequently his mental good,” Bok wrote, arguing that kids under age 15 should be outside playing with friends after school and should go to sleep after dinner. Homework was banned for a while in public schools in Boston, the entire state of California and other places, and from 1900 to 1940 progressive education scholars tried to get it abolished everywhere.

They ultimately lost, but debate over the value of homework for students, especially young ones, continues today, along with a relatively new wrinkle: Should homework be graded? It’s part of a revolution in grading that has quietly been underway for years in some districts but that gained attention when more districts began looking at changing grading systems during the coronavirus pandemic.

This article looks in depth at the controversy over grading homework. It was written by Rick Wormeli, a former National Board Certified teacher in Virginia who now consults with schools and districts on classroom practice and grading systems. He is the author of “ Fair Isn’t Always Equal: Assessment and Grading in the Differentiated Classroom, Second Edition. ”

Teachers second-guess letter grades as they search for a fairer way

By Rich Wormeli

Some school districts in our area are considering proposals to revise their policies for reporting homework completion and students’ timely adherence to deadlines so that these reports do not count in final, academic grades of subject content. A few in these communities are pushing back on this idea, declaring that such policies do not teach responsibility, with at least one observer calling the suggested policies, “dumb,” and, “a formula for disaster.” (See, Mathews, “ Abolishing grades on homework will hurt the neediest kids ,” Washington Post, Dec. 26, 2021, and his follow-up piece on the same topic on April 3, 2022). To these individuals, I offer a deeper dive, as the new policies are legitimate.

Everyone in a student’s academic life agrees that grades should be accurate reports of student proficiencies regarding what is being taught: One student’s grade in science reflects her understanding of photosynthesis, and another’s grade in Algebra reflects his skills in graphing inequalities. With accuracy like this, we can provide helpful feedback and make effective decisions regarding students’ current and future learning.

If we include reports of elements not indicative of the proficiencies we claim to report, we distort the truth about students’ learning. We are an ethical profession, however; we don’t lie to students or their parents. It makes sense, then, to remove any practice that falsifies grade reports and to do more of those things that assure truthful reporting.

With integrity paramount, we cannot conflate the report of doing things (compliance) with the reporting of learning things (mastery or proficiency), as doing so distorts the accuracy of the report of either one individually. During the years of my teaching in Loudoun and Fairfax County schools, some students demonstrated 75 percent proficiency in the previous year’s material, but the previous year’s teachers recorded an A or 100 percent on their report cards because these students completed homework on time, maintained organized notebooks, and worked collaboratively. These elements counted 25 percent of the grade. They were helpful things, of course, but they were not evidence of what teachers claim to be reporting.

Study provides rare control group review of standards-based grading craze

In addition, we do not want to give students a false sense of competence in their learning as this creates embarrassment later when they, their parents, and future teachers think students are competent, but it turns out to be a mirage. These individuals are left gawping at what others in their courses easily understand and do. This can happen when we buffer grades with elements such as “completed homework,” and adding extra points to an assignment’s score because the student brought in extra canned food for the canned food drive.

So, what does this mean for modern grading practices? It means we report elements like homework completion and timely adherence to deadlines separately from subject proficiency on the report card. We are careful not to blur the lines between reporting students’ compliance with tasks with students’ proficiency in Latin declension or proper weightlifting techniques.

Work on homework assignments is not evidence of final level of proficiency. Instead, it provides feedback and informs where we go next in instruction. No professional in any field would accept weaving in reports of their first, inexact, attempts in learning with the final report of their solid competence at the end of their learning journey and proven licensure, as it would create a false report of current proficiency. If we wouldn’t tolerate this inaccurate reporting in working world evaluations, what makes it legitimate in our schools? The grade at course’s end should be an accurate report for the subject proficiencies demonstrated at that point, not a report of the road students traveled to get there.

Consider, too, that homework assignments are used as coaching and practice tools for students as they learn content and skills. Any assessment of learning along the way such as we get when looking over students’ practice work is a one-moment-in-time progress check as students grow towards demonstrable competence. Here, we provide timely feedback, and students self-monitor their learning rather than depending exclusively on others to tell them how they are doing. As a result, students own their learning, and learned helplessness and making excuses fall away.

We don’t want to invoke self-preservation here, which happens often with adolescents. If our first steps with a topic are allowed to significantly alter the final report of our competence in that topic, we self-preserve, protect ego, and essentially give up, letting you think we can do it but that we choose not to, or were irresponsible. For many of us, it’s better you think me competent than give you proof that I’m incompetent and don’t belong. Interestingly, teachers are actually more demanding of students by maintaining students’ hope in their learning potential. Invoking self-preservation with high stakes homework, however, lets students escape the burden of their learning and growing maturity.

To provide gravitas and help educators and communities avoid deflecting on this issue, consider the many court cases speaking to this concern, with brief statements from two of them included here (taken from Guskey and Brookhart, “ What We Know about Grading ”):

• Smith v. School City of Hobart (1993): “A federal judge rules that grade reductions for nonacademic reasons result in, “clear misrepresentation of the student’s scholastic achievement, … Misrepresentation of achievement is equally improper … and illegal whether the achievement is misrepresented by upgrading or downgrading, if either is done for reason that are irrelevant to the achievement being graded. For example, one would hardly deem acceptable an upgrading in a mathematics course for achievement on the playing field.”
• Court[s] … have relied on grade accuracy to mean “the extent that it permits someone to estimate the extent of a student’s knowledge and skills in a given area” (Chartier, 2003, p. 41)…[I]ncluding factors such as ability, effort, improvement, or work completion in grades may not be legally defensible.”

Finally, let’s look at the research on teaching accountability and whether counting practice (homework) and penalties for late work in academic course grade teaches students self-discipline and responsibility. Consider (from Guskey’s “Five Obstacles to Grading Reform”):

[N]o research supports the idea that low grades prompt students to try harder. More often, low grades prompt students to withdraw from learning. To protect their self-images, many students regard the low grade as irrelevant or meaningless. Others may blame themselves for the low grade but feel helpless to improve (Selby & Murphy, 1992).

To those expressing concerns about teaching responsibility, I invite you to study the research and many resources on how adults cultivate such maturity in their students. Policies such as one grade lower for each day late and counting homework completion in the final performance of proficiency don’t hold up under scrutiny. Tom Schimmer, author of “ Grading from the Inside Out ,” and former teacher and principal, wrote :

One of the biggest misunderstandings of standards-based grading is that the non-achievement factors don’t matter; they do. Achievement grades are the reason students will ultimately gain entry into college; their habits of learning are the reason they will graduate from college. It is not okay for students to turn work in late. But it’s equally not okay to distort achievement levels as a result of lateness.

He also wrote that having such a factor contribute “to a student’s achievement grade would be inequitable and even unethical.”

Students are behind in math and reading. Are schools doing enough?

All of us want students to develop self-discipline, perseverance, time management, consideration for others, and to start projects the week they are assigned instead of five weeks later, the night before they are due. If we look closely, though, we find that none of the research on how to teach these skills calls for counting homework in the final academic grade or by recording unrecoverable zeros and F’s when work is not completed or not completed on time.

What we find instead are robust and practical insights for building executive function skills, fostering independence, asking students to self-monitor their own learning, building agency (voice and choice in learning), and facilitating students’ growing self-efficacy.

For example, consider these major executive function skills promoted in “ Smart, but Scattered for Teens” : response inhibition, working memory, emotional control, flexibility, sustained attention, task initiation, planning/prioritizing, organization, time management, goal-directed persistence, and metacognition. Do we see anything here that would contribute positively to homework completion and student success? Yes, all of them. Let’s overtly teach these skills instead of scolding from afar in the mistaken assumption that lowering grades helps students mature.

Reporting homework separately is making sure homework “counts,” putting homework completion on its own radar, and giving it increased importance, not less. This is raising expectations, not lowering them. It’s a teacher cop-out when we assign unrecoverable zeros and F’s to work not done on the timeline we declared, as students don’t have to do it now. The message is clear here: This work is skippable and not important. If it’s worth assigning, however, it matters: It’s not busy-work, it’s not skippable. The consequence for not doing your work is giving up other activities and doing the work.

Admissions officers and military recruiters over the decades share repeatedly that they like to see work habits such as homework completion and timely adherence to deadlines reported separately for all four years of high school. This allows them to trust the academic grades as more accurate indicators of students’ real learning and to gauge the candidate’s mettle for their upcoming program. To reinforce the life lesson that hard work often results in higher achievement, report homework completion separately from academic performance and ask the student to note the correlations: higher completion rate yields higher performance, lower completion rate yields lower performance.

Also note that sometimes we get students who do little or no homework, yet they perform among the highest in the class. There is no cheating here; the students have after-school responsibilities that are simply more urgent: Taking care of aging parents or younger siblings, working after school in order to help the family pay for food and rent, or getting extra assistance in another course. When such a mismatch happens, we have to question the value of students doing those homework assignments: Did they really matter to students’ success, or were they merely busy work, making school about compliance, not learning?

Mathews, in his 2021 Post column on the subject, quotes Wakefield High School teachers’ criticism: “ [T]he Spring 2020 virtual learning experiment during the [coronavirus] pandemic taught most of us that students do not, will not, complete work if it is not for a grade,” and he repeats the statement in his April 3, 2022 , update of the controversial topic. But let’s consider the spring of 2020 when schools first closed at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Remember the panic we were feeling? We were in free fall, wondering which end was up. Students were navigating the loss of normalcy, removal of expected rituals and experiences, fears over others seeing their home lives via Zoom, inappropriate learning conditions at home, caring for parents and grandparents, increased opioid and alcohol use in self or family, wild mood swings, dramatic changes in sleep, isolation/loneliness, going through puberty, limited access to technology/resources/food, jobless parents due to economic downturn, transportation challenges, limited skills in executive function, depression/anxiety, and were dealing with increasing biases, racism, and political hostilities.

On top of this, Arlington County educators and other teachers around the nation were on a steep learning curve, barely ahead of their students on how to make virtual instruction work. Many of us were not very effective at it; we didn’t have the tools and know-how to make learning engaging via the camera lens in spring 2020. It’s a credit to teachers and students that everyone did as well as they did. Using that time of angst with all that was happening on both sides of the camera as conclusive proof that students will only do homework when it is graded, however, doesn’t make sense: It’s a flawed understanding of proper research practices to make such a claim.

In that same April 3, 2022 update, Mathews says that providing feedback on homework, not grades is a, “a lovely image, but … is at odds with modern adolescence. The distractions of teenage life are at war with the notion that students will do better if teachers remove deadlines.” Actually, none of the standards-based learning advocates, as Mathews cited, including Joe Feldman, Emily Rickema, and Ken O’Connor, advocates for removing deadlines. Deadlines still matter, and students are taught diligently how to meet them. Punitive and distorted grade reports, however, are not the way to teach it.

Second, let’s do a deeper dive into what we know about today’s adolescents before we make such generalizations based on what a few teachers say. Adolescents do respond well to classrooms of agency, developmentally appropriate instruction, complex, demanding instruction, and hope. This means we require students to do the heavy lifting to analyze their practice work against standards of excellence and use that knowledge to inform next steps in learning while being assured that these assignments are only progress checks, not the ultimate judgment of competence. When early attempts at mastery are not used against them, and accountability comes in the form of actually learning content, adolescents flourish. No research in our profession concludes that knowingly falsifying grade reports is an effective way to help students mature and deal with the distractions of teenage life.

Let’s implement the practices that lead to student success. Coercive efforts such as counting homework completion and timeliness in an academic grade are about control, not learning or student maturation. Work completion and timeliness are deeply important virtues, of course, but conflating them with academic performance provides a false sense that students are learning and maturing. Homework completion should count 100 percent, and timeliness of assignment submissions should count 100 percent. Yes, quote me correctly, both should count 100 percent — of their own columns on the report card. They should count 0 percent, however, of the report of what students know about mitosis or coding in Python.

Accountability can be defined as entering mutual ethos with one another: I’m looking out for your success as much as you are looking out for mine. As teachers, that means we come prepared to teach diverse students substantive content and skills, and we hold ourselves accountable to powerful ethics as professionals. We study the role of homework in student learning, and we don’t undermine its positive effects by conflating what should be practice with high stakes, final designations of competence. In this, our students are well served.

Teachers say parents, laws are changing how they teach race and gender

Why I Think All Schools Should Abolish Homework

H ow long is your child’s workweek? Thirty hours? Forty? Would it surprise you to learn that some elementary school kids have workweeks comparable to adults’ schedules? For most children, mandatory homework assignments push their workweek far beyond the school day and deep into what any other laborers would consider overtime. Even without sports or music or other school-sponsored extracurriculars, the daily homework slog keeps many students on the clock as long as lawyers, teachers, medical residents, truck drivers and other overworked adults. Is it any wonder that,deprived of the labor protections that we provide adults, our kids are suffering an epidemic of disengagement, anxiety and depression ?

With my youngest child just months away from finishing high school, I’m remembering all the needless misery and missed opportunities all three of my kids suffered because of their endless assignments. When my daughters were in middle school, I would urge them into bed before midnight and then find them clandestinely studying under the covers with a flashlight. We cut back on their activities but still found ourselves stuck in a system on overdrive, returning home from hectic days at 6 p.m. only to face hours more of homework. Now, even as a senior with a moderate course load, my son, Zak, has spent many weekends studying, finding little time for the exercise and fresh air essential to his well-being. Week after week, and without any extracurriculars, Zak logs a lot more than the 40 hours adults traditionally work each week — and with no recognition from his “bosses” that it’s too much. I can’t count the number of shared evenings, weekend outings and dinners that our family has missed and will never get back.

How much after-school time should our schools really own?

In the midst of the madness last fall, Zak said to me, “I feel like I’m working towards my death. The constant demands on my time since 5th grade are just going to continue through graduation, into college, and then into my job. It’s like I’m on an endless treadmill with no time for living.”

My spirit crumbled along with his.

Like Zak, many people are now questioning the point of putting so much demand on children and teens that they become thinly stretched and overworked. Studies have long shown that there is no academic benefit to high school homework that consumes more than a modest number of hours each week. In a study of high schoolers conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), researchers concluded that “after around four hours of homework per week, the additional time invested in homework has a negligible impact on performance.”

In elementary school, where we often assign overtime even to the youngest children, studies have shown there’s no academic benefit to any amount of homework at all.

Our unquestioned acceptance of homework also flies in the face of all we know about human health, brain function and learning. Brain scientists know that rest and exercise are essential to good health and real learning . Even top adult professionals in specialized fields take care to limit their work to concentrated periods of focus. A landmark study of how humans develop expertise found that elite musicians, scientists and athletes do their most productive work only about four hours per day .

Yet we continue to overwork our children, depriving them of the chance to cultivate health and learn deeply, burdening them with an imbalance of sedentary, academic tasks. American high school students , in fact, do more homework each week than their peers in the average country in the OECD, a 2014 report found.

It’s time for an uprising.

Already, small rebellions are starting. High schools in Ridgewood, N.J. , and Fairfax County, Va., among others, have banned homework over school breaks. The entire second grade at Taylor Elementary School in Arlington, Va., abolished homework this academic year. Burton Valley Elementary School in Lafayette, Calif., has eliminated homework in grades K through 4. Henry West Laboratory School , a public K-8 school in Coral Gables, Fla., eliminated mandatory, graded homework for optional assignments. One Lexington, Mass., elementary school is piloting a homework-free year, replacing it with reading for pleasure.

More from TIME

Across the Atlantic, students in Spain launched a national strike against excessive assignments in November. And a second-grade teacher in Texas, made headlines this fall when she quit sending home extra work , instead urging families to “spend your evenings doing things that are proven to correlate with student success. Eat dinner as a family, read together, play outside and get your child to bed early.”

It is time that we call loudly for a clear and simple change: a workweek limit for children, counting time on the clock before and after the final bell. Why should schools extend their authority far beyond the boundaries of campus, dictating activities in our homes in the hours that belong to families? An all-out ban on after-school assignments would be optimal. Short of that, we can at least sensibly agree on a cap limiting kids to a 40-hour workweek — and fewer hours for younger children.

Resistance even to this reasonable limit will be rife. Mike Miller, an English teacher at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, Va., found this out firsthand when he spearheaded a homework committee to rethink the usual approach. He had read the education research and found a forgotten policy on the county books limiting homework to two hours a night, total, including all classes. “I thought it would be a slam dunk” to put the two-hour cap firmly in place, Miller said.

But immediately, people started balking. “There was a lot of fear in the community,” Miller said. “It’s like jumping off a high dive with your kids’ future. If we reduce homework to two hours or less, is my kid really going to be okay?” In the end, the committee only agreed to a homework ban over school breaks.

Miller’s response is a great model for us all. He decided to limit assignments in his own class to 20 minutes a night (the most allowed for a student with six classes to hit the two-hour max). His students didn’t suddenly fail. Their test scores remained stable. And they started using their more breathable schedule to do more creative, thoughtful work.

That’s the way we will get to a sane work schedule for kids: by simultaneously pursuing changes big and small. Even as we collaboratively press for policy changes at the district or individual school level, all teachers can act now, as individuals, to ease the strain on overworked kids.

As parents and students, we can also organize to make homework the exception rather than the rule. We can insist that every family, teacher and student be allowed to opt out of assignments without penalty to make room for important activities, and we can seek changes that shift practice exercises and assignments into the actual school day.

We’ll know our work is done only when Zak and every other child can clock out, eat dinner, sleep well and stay healthy — the very things needed to engage and learn deeply. That’s the basic standard the law applies to working adults. Let’s do the same for our kids.

Vicki Abeles is the author of the bestseller Beyond Measure: Rescuing an Overscheduled, Overtested, Underestimated Generation, and director and producer of the documentaries “ Race to Nowhere ” and “ Beyond Measure. ”

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• The Highlight

Nobody knows what the point of homework is

The homework wars are back.

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As the Covid-19 pandemic began and students logged into their remote classrooms, all work, in effect, became homework. But whether or not students could complete it at home varied. For some, schoolwork became public-library work or McDonald’s-parking-lot work.

Luis Torres, the principal of PS 55, a predominantly low-income community elementary school in the south Bronx, told me that his school secured Chromebooks for students early in the pandemic only to learn that some lived in shelters that blocked wifi for security reasons. Others, who lived in housing projects with poor internet reception, did their schoolwork in laundromats.

According to a 2021 Pew survey , 25 percent of lower-income parents said their children, at some point, were unable to complete their schoolwork because they couldn’t access a computer at home; that number for upper-income parents was 2 percent.

The issues with remote learning in March 2020 were new. But they highlighted a divide that had been there all along in another form: homework. And even long after schools have resumed in-person classes, the pandemic’s effects on homework have lingered.

Over the past three years, in response to concerns about equity, schools across the country, including in Sacramento, Los Angeles , San Diego , and Clark County, Nevada , made permanent changes to their homework policies that restricted how much homework could be given and how it could be graded after in-person learning resumed.

Three years into the pandemic, as districts and teachers reckon with Covid-era overhauls of teaching and learning, schools are still reconsidering the purpose and place of homework. Whether relaxing homework expectations helps level the playing field between students or harms them by decreasing rigor is a divisive issue without conclusive evidence on either side, echoing other debates in education like the elimination of standardized test scores from some colleges’ admissions processes.

I first began to wonder if the homework abolition movement made sense after speaking with teachers in some Massachusetts public schools, who argued that rather than help disadvantaged kids, stringent homework restrictions communicated an attitude of low expectations. One, an English teacher, said she felt the school had “just given up” on trying to get the students to do work; another argued that restrictions that prohibit teachers from assigning take-home work that doesn’t begin in class made it difficult to get through the foreign-language curriculum. Teachers in other districts have raised formal concerns about homework abolition’s ability to close gaps among students rather than widening them.

Many education experts share this view. Harris Cooper, a professor emeritus of psychology at Duke who has studied homework efficacy, likened homework abolition to “playing to the lowest common denominator.”

But as I learned after talking to a variety of stakeholders — from homework researchers to policymakers to parents of schoolchildren — whether to abolish homework probably isn’t the right question. More important is what kind of work students are sent home with and where they can complete it. Chances are, if schools think more deeply about giving constructive work, time spent on homework will come down regardless.

There’s no consensus on whether homework works

The rise of the no-homework movement during the Covid-19 pandemic tapped into long-running disagreements over homework’s impact on students. The purpose and effectiveness of homework have been disputed for well over a century. In 1901, for instance, California banned homework for students up to age 15, and limited it for older students, over concerns that it endangered children’s mental and physical health. The newest iteration of the anti-homework argument contends that the current practice punishes students who lack support and rewards those with more resources, reinforcing the “myth of meritocracy.”

But there is still no research consensus on homework’s effectiveness; no one can seem to agree on what the right metrics are. Much of the debate relies on anecdotes, intuition, or speculation.

Researchers disagree even on how much research exists on the value of homework. Kathleen Budge, the co-author of Turning High-Poverty Schools Into High-Performing Schools and a professor at Boise State, told me that homework “has been greatly researched.” Denise Pope, a Stanford lecturer and leader of the education nonprofit Challenge Success, said, “It’s not a highly researched area because of some of the methodological problems.”

Experts who are more sympathetic to take-home assignments generally support the “10-minute rule,” a framework that estimates the ideal amount of homework on any given night by multiplying the student’s grade by 10 minutes. (A ninth grader, for example, would have about 90 minutes of work a night.) Homework proponents argue that while it is difficult to design randomized control studies to test homework’s effectiveness, the vast majority of existing studies show a strong positive correlation between homework and high academic achievement for middle and high school students. Prominent critics of homework argue that these correlational studies are unreliable and point to studies that suggest a neutral or negative effect on student performance. Both agree there is little to no evidence for homework’s effectiveness at an elementary school level, though proponents often argue that it builds constructive habits for the future.

For anyone who remembers homework assignments from both good and bad teachers, this fundamental disagreement might not be surprising. Some homework is pointless and frustrating to complete. Every week during my senior year of high school, I had to analyze a poem for English and decorate it with images found on Google; my most distinct memory from that class is receiving a demoralizing 25-point deduction because I failed to present my analysis on a poster board. Other assignments really do help students learn: After making an adapted version of Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book for a ninth grade history project, I was inspired to check out from the library and read a biography of the Chinese ruler.

For homework opponents, the first example is more likely to resonate. “We’re all familiar with the negative effects of homework: stress, exhaustion, family conflict, less time for other activities, diminished interest in learning,” Alfie Kohn, author of The Homework Myth, which challenges common justifications for homework, told me in an email. “And these effects may be most pronounced among low-income students.” Kohn believes that schools should make permanent any moratoria implemented during the pandemic, arguing that there are no positives at all to outweigh homework’s downsides. Recent studies , he argues , show the benefits may not even materialize during high school.

In the Marlborough Public Schools, a suburban district 45 minutes west of Boston, school policy committee chair Katherine Hennessy described getting kids to complete their homework during remote education as “a challenge, to say the least.” Teachers found that students who spent all day on their computers didn’t want to spend more time online when the day was over. So, for a few months, the school relaxed the usual practice and teachers slashed the quantity of nightly homework.

Online learning made the preexisting divides between students more apparent, she said. Many students, even during normal circumstances, lacked resources to keep them on track and focused on completing take-home assignments. Though Marlborough Schools is more affluent than PS 55, Hennessy said many students had parents whose work schedules left them unable to provide homework help in the evenings. The experience tracked with a common divide in the country between children of different socioeconomic backgrounds.

So in October 2021, months after the homework reduction began, the Marlborough committee made a change to the district’s policy. While teachers could still give homework, the assignments had to begin as classwork. And though teachers could acknowledge homework completion in a student’s participation grade, they couldn’t count homework as its own grading category. “Rigorous learning in the classroom does not mean that that classwork must be assigned every night,” the policy stated . “Extensions of class work is not to be used to teach new content or as a form of punishment.”

Canceling homework might not do anything for the achievement gap

The critiques of homework are valid as far as they go, but at a certain point, arguments against homework can defy the commonsense idea that to retain what they’re learning, students need to practice it.

“Doesn’t a kid become a better reader if he reads more? Doesn’t a kid learn his math facts better if he practices them?” said Cathy Vatterott, an education researcher and professor emeritus at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. After decades of research, she said it’s still hard to isolate the value of homework, but that doesn’t mean it should be abandoned.

Blanket vilification of homework can also conflate the unique challenges facing disadvantaged students as compared to affluent ones, which could have different solutions. “The kids in the low-income schools are being hurt because they’re being graded, unfairly, on time they just don’t have to do this stuff,” Pope told me. “And they’re still being held accountable for turning in assignments, whether they’re meaningful or not.” On the other side, “Palo Alto kids” — students in Silicon Valley’s stereotypically pressure-cooker public schools — “are just bombarded and overloaded and trying to stay above water.”

Merely getting rid of homework doesn’t solve either problem. The United States already has the second-highest disparity among OECD (the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) nations between time spent on homework by students of high and low socioeconomic status — a difference of more than three hours, said Janine Bempechat, clinical professor at Boston University and author of No More Mindless Homework .

When she interviewed teachers in Boston-area schools that had cut homework before the pandemic, Bempechat told me, “What they saw immediately was parents who could afford it immediately enrolled their children in the Russian School of Mathematics,” a math-enrichment program whose tuition ranges from $140 to about $400 a month. Getting rid of homework “does nothing for equity; it increases the opportunity gap between wealthier and less wealthy families,” she said. “That solution troubles me because it’s no solution at all.”

A group of teachers at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia, made the same point after the school district proposed an overhaul of its homework policies, including removing penalties for missing homework deadlines, allowing unlimited retakes, and prohibiting grading of homework.

“Given the emphasis on equity in today’s education systems,” they wrote in a letter to the school board, “we believe that some of the proposed changes will actually have a detrimental impact towards achieving this goal. Families that have means could still provide challenging and engaging academic experiences for their children and will continue to do so, especially if their children are not experiencing expected rigor in the classroom.” At a school where more than a third of students are low-income, the teachers argued, the policies would prompt students “to expect the least of themselves in terms of effort, results, and responsibility.”

Not all homework is created equal

Despite their opposing sides in the homework wars, most of the researchers I spoke to made a lot of the same points. Both Bempechat and Pope were quick to bring up how parents and schools confuse rigor with workload, treating the volume of assignments as a proxy for quality of learning. Bempechat, who is known for defending homework, has written extensively about how plenty of it lacks clear purpose, requires the purchasing of unnecessary supplies, and takes longer than it needs to. Likewise, when Pope instructs graduate-level classes on curriculum, she asks her students to think about the larger purpose they’re trying to achieve with homework: If they can get the job done in the classroom, there’s no point in sending home more work.

At its best, pandemic-era teaching facilitated that last approach. Honolulu-based teacher Christina Torres Cawdery told me that, early in the pandemic, she often had a cohort of kids in her classroom for four hours straight, as her school tried to avoid too much commingling. She couldn’t lecture for four hours, so she gave the students plenty of time to complete independent and project-based work. At the end of most school days, she didn’t feel the need to send them home with more to do.

A similar limited-homework philosophy worked at a public middle school in Chelsea, Massachusetts. A couple of teachers there turned as much class as possible into an opportunity for small-group practice, allowing kids to work on problems that traditionally would be assigned for homework, Jessica Flick, a math coach who leads department meetings at the school, told me. It was inspired by a philosophy pioneered by Simon Fraser University professor Peter Liljedahl, whose influential book Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics reframes homework as “check-your-understanding questions” rather than as compulsory work. Last year, Flick found that the two eighth grade classes whose teachers adopted this strategy performed the best on state tests, and this year, she has encouraged other teachers to implement it.

Teachers know that plenty of homework is tedious and unproductive. Jeannemarie Dawson De Quiroz, who has taught for more than 20 years in low-income Boston and Los Angeles pilot and charter schools, says that in her first years on the job she frequently assigned “drill and kill” tasks and questions that she now feels unfairly stumped students. She said designing good homework wasn’t part of her teaching programs, nor was it meaningfully discussed in professional development. With more experience, she turned as much class time as she could into practice time and limited what she sent home.

“The thing about homework that’s sticky is that not all homework is created equal,” says Jill Harrison Berg, a former teacher and the author of Uprooting Instructional Inequity . “Some homework is a genuine waste of time and requires lots of resources for no good reason. And other homework is really useful.”

Cutting homework has to be part of a larger strategy

The takeaways are clear: Schools can make cuts to homework, but those cuts should be part of a strategy to improve the quality of education for all students. If the point of homework was to provide more practice, districts should think about how students can make it up during class — or offer time during or after school for students to seek help from teachers. If it was to move the curriculum along, it’s worth considering whether strategies like Liljedahl’s can get more done in less time.

Some of the best thinking around effective assignments comes from those most critical of the current practice. Denise Pope proposes that, before assigning homework, teachers should consider whether students understand the purpose of the work and whether they can do it without help. If teachers think it’s something that can’t be done in class, they should be mindful of how much time it should take and the feedback they should provide. It’s questions like these that De Quiroz considered before reducing the volume of work she sent home.

More than a year after the new homework policy began in Marlborough, Hennessy still hears from parents who incorrectly “think homework isn’t happening” despite repeated assurances that kids still can receive work. She thinks part of the reason is that education has changed over the years. “I think what we’re trying to do is establish that homework may be an element of educating students,” she told me. “But it may not be what parents think of as what they grew up with. ... It’s going to need to adapt, per the teaching and the curriculum, and how it’s being delivered in each classroom.”

For the policy to work, faculty, parents, and students will all have to buy into a shared vision of what school ought to look like. The district is working on it — in November, it hosted and uploaded to YouTube a round-table discussion on homework between district administrators — but considering the sustained confusion, the path ahead seems difficult.

When I asked Luis Torres about whether he thought homework serves a useful part in PS 55’s curriculum, he said yes, of course it was — despite the effort and money it takes to keep the school open after hours to help them do it. “The children need the opportunity to practice,” he said. “If you don’t give them opportunities to practice what they learn, they’re going to forget.” But Torres doesn’t care if the work is done at home. The school stays open until around 6 pm on weekdays, even during breaks. Tutors through New York City’s Department of Youth and Community Development programs help kids with work after school so they don’t need to take it with them.

As schools weigh the purpose of homework in an unequal world, it’s tempting to dispose of a practice that presents real, practical problems to students across the country. But getting rid of homework is unlikely to do much good on its own. Before cutting it, it’s worth thinking about what good assignments are meant to do in the first place. It’s crucial that students from all socioeconomic backgrounds tackle complex quantitative problems and hone their reading and writing skills. It’s less important that the work comes home with them.

Jacob Sweet is a freelance writer in Somerville, Massachusetts. He is a frequent contributor to the New Yorker, among other publications.

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I'm a teacher and a parent. My advice to other parents is not to make kids do homework straight after school.

• Laura Linn Knight taught in elementary schools for five years and has two children of her own. 
• Here she shares tips for parents when it comes to homework and when to have kids do theirs. 
• This is Knight's story, as told to Lauren Crosby Medlicott.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Laura Linn Knight . It has been edited for length and clarity.

After teaching in elementary schools for five years, I thought I would easily be able to manage my own children, but after having two, I quickly found out parenting was a very different skill from teaching. I found myself getting caught in power struggles with toddlers and couldn't understand why they wouldn't listen to me. I remember reacting often with yelling, and after some time, I thought there had to be another way.

I started immersing myself in parenting books, trying to find theoretical and practical ways I could create a calm home , which led me to train to become a certified positive-discipline educator . I felt like our home had become a place of peace again as I used the tools I had learned, but then my kids started coming home from school with homework.

I found they didn't have the stamina to sit with me and learn. They were exhausted from a day of education. They would both get really frustrated with me.

"I already know how to do this," they would say. "I don't want you to tell me how to do this. Can I get some water? I just need to sharpen my pencil."

I was a trained teacher who should've been able to get her kids to do their homework without a battle, but it wasn't working. There were tantrums, resistance, and tears.

Related stories

That was the point I knew things had to change.

We worked as a family to find a solution

I called a family meeting around the kitchen table and told the kids I noticed homework had been really tough for everyone.

"I want to come up with a plan together so we can get homework done and make sure you feel supported to get it done," I told them.

We came up with a plan that we tried for a few weeks. It didn't work. We went back to the family table and decided on another.

Each day, the kids would come home from school, have a quick snack, play with each other or friends, do their homework, and then have dinner. This plan worked — they decompressed and refueled before starting on their homework.

Here's what I recommend

There's no one recipe for every family, but here are some tips for figuring out your after-school routine.

Have a family meeting. Parents often think that by collaborating with their kids, they are releasing control and authority, but collaboration is known to make those included feel heard and valued. When children feel they aren't just being told what to do, they are more likely to want to participate.

Ask them what they think would help them get their homework done. Obviously, you'll need to set up some boundaries for this. For example, your kids may want to do homework in front of the TV. That is something that you can almost guarantee isn't going to work. Make a plan together, try out that plan, and reassess it after a set amount of time.

Always make sure they have had a snack. You want to make sure kids have fuel to do the work they are being asked to do.

As the parent, ensure you are going into homework time in a relaxed state. Parents set the tone, and when they are regulated and calm, it is more likely the children will be, too. Take time to take a few deep breaths alone to decompress before helping your child complete their homework.

Give your child time to decompress after school. That may look like playing soccer, building a Lego set, or doing imaginative play. Their brains and bodies need that time to settle before being expected to work.

Try to make it fun. I find this really difficult, but my husband is really good at it. Homework is meant to be a review of things already taught and learned, so bring a bit of silliness to it. Get creative with ways you can complete the homework.

Homework gives parents another chance to spend time with their children. Life gets busy, but homework has to get done. As hard as it sometimes is, try to remember that homework isn't just a chore but also dedicated time to spend time with your child.

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Should Students Have Homework?

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By Suzanne Capek Tingley, Veteran Educator, M.A. Degree

It used to be that students were the only ones complaining about the practice of assigning homework. For years, teachers and parents thought that homework was a necessary tool when educating children. But studies about the effectiveness of homework have been conflicting and inconclusive, leading some adults to argue that homework should become a thing of the past.

What Research Says about Homework

According to Duke professor Harris Cooper, it's important that students have homework. His meta-analysis of homework studies showed a correlation between completing homework and academic success, at least in older grades. He recommends following a  "10 minute rule" : students should receive 10 minutes of homework per day in first grade, and 10 additional minutes each subsequent year, so that by twelfth grade they are completing 120 minutes of homework daily.

But his analysis didn't prove that students did better because they did homework; it simply  showed a correlation . This could simply mean that kids who do homework are more committed to doing well in school. Cooper also found that some research showed that homework caused physical and emotional stress, and created negative attitudes about learning. He suggested that more research needed to be done on homework's effect on kids.

Some researchers say that the question isn't whether kids should have homework. It's more about what kind of homework students have and how much. To be effective, homework has to meet students' needs. For example, some  middle school teachers have found success with online math homework  that's adapted to each student's level of understanding. But when middle school students were assigned more than an hour and a half of homework, their  math and science test scores went down .

Researchers at Indiana University discovered that math and science homework may improve standardized test grades, but they  found no difference in course grades  between students who did homework and those who didn't. These researchers theorize that homework doesn't result in more content mastery, but in greater familiarity with the kinds of questions that appear on standardized tests. According to Professor Adam Maltese, one of the study's authors, "Our results hint that maybe homework is not being used as well as it could be."

So while many teachers and parents support daily homework, it's hard to find strong evidence that the long-held practice produces positive results.

Problems with Homework

In an article in  Education Week Teacher , teacher Samantha Hulsman said she's frequently heard parents complain that a 30-minute homework assignment turns into a three-hour battle with their kids. Now, she's facing the same problem with her own kids, which has her rethinking her former beliefs about homework. "I think parents expect their children to have homework nightly, and teachers assign daily homework because it's what we've always done," she explained. Today, Hulsman said, it's more important to know how to collaborate and solve problems than it is to know specific facts.

Child psychologist Kenneth Barish wrote in  Psychology Today  that  battles over homework rarely result in a child's improvement in school . Children who don't do their homework are not lazy, he said, but they may be frustrated, discouraged, or anxious. And for kids with learning disabilities, homework is like "running with a sprained ankle. It's doable, but painful."

Barish suggests that parents and kids have a "homework plan" that limits the time spent on homework. The plan should include turning off all devices—not just the student's, but those belonging to all family members.

One of the  best-known critics of homework, Alfie Kohn , says that some people wrongly believe "kids are like vending machines—put in an assignment, get out learning." Kohn points to the lack of evidence that homework is an effective learning tool; in fact, he calls it "the greatest single extinguisher of children's curiosity that we have yet invented."

Homework Bans

Last year, the public schools in Marion County, Florida,  decided on a no-homework policy for all of their elementary students . Instead,  kids read nightly  for 20 minutes. Superintendent Heidi Maier said the decision was based on Cooper's research showing that elementary students gain little from homework, but a lot from reading.

Orchard Elementary School in South Burlington, Vermont, followed the same path, substituting reading for homework. The  homework policy has four parts : read nightly, go outside and play, have dinner with your family, and get a good night's sleep. Principal Mark Trifilio says that his staff and parents support the idea.

But while many elementary schools are considering no-homework policies, middle schools and high schools have been reluctant to abandon homework. Schools say parents support homework and teachers know it can be helpful when it is specific and follows certain guidelines. For example, practicing solving word problems can be helpful, but there's no reason to assign 50 problems when 10 will do. Recognizing that not all kids have the time, space, and home support to do homework is important, so it shouldn't be counted as part of a student's grade.

So Should Students Have Homework?

Should you ban homework in your classroom? If you teach lower grades, it's possible. If you teach middle or high school, probably not. But all teachers should think carefully about their homework policies. By limiting the amount of homework and improving the quality of assignments, you can improve learning outcomes for your students.

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An after-school routine to help kids and parents beat homework stress

Back to school can be a difficult transition for many families , but even more challenging for some is the return to homework — for both kids and parents.

A new survey from Office Depot finds that nearly 25 percent of parents think their children are given more homework than they can handle, while four in five parents said they have struggled to understand their kids’ homework. Additionally, the survey found that nearly 50 percent of parents would opt their child out of receiving homework in at least one subject area, while one in three fessed up to having finished their child’s homework for them.

“We were surprised to find that nearly one in three parents admitted to completing their child’s homework for them at least once,” says Natalie Malaszenko, SVP, eCommerce for Office Depot. “We can only speculate, but parents might feel compelled to complete their child’s homework to help minimize their child's stress: 50 percent of parents reported their child has cried due to homework stress. Minimizing arguments could also be a factor since nearly 40 percent of parents argue with their child about homework at least once a week.”

Though some schools are banning homework , partly in response to growing research around the potential harm in overloading children , homework is still the law of the land for most school-aged children.

How can young kids and parents tackle after school assignments without any arguments or meltdowns? We spoke with a number of experts to build an optimal routine for getting homework done.

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Make it predictable.

Having a routine around homework is half the battle, suggests Joanne Ketch , a psychotherapist who has also served as an assistant principal and school counselor at a college prep private school in Texas.

“Make it predictable, preferably in the same place and at the same time each day,” says Ketch. “This routine trains the brain to prepare for homework and study, and the brain will begin to anticipate the activity and gather and prepare itself to be in the best mode for study.”

Emily Denbow Morrison , a high school English teacher adds that “when we make doing homework less of a decision and more of a natural habit for kids, they are far less likely to put it off.”

It’s been a long time since most of us revisited algebra, geometry, or the fall of ancient Rome, and even if it hasn't been that long, who says we understood it the first time?

Emily Denbow Morrison

Set up an organized, distraction-free space

An environment conducive to your child’s productivity is key. Denise L. Merchant , a former special education director and founder of Seeds of Advocacy , an education consulting firm, suggests that parents secure “quiet, clear from distraction space”.

“Make sure that there are appropriate utensils for the child: rulers, paper, erasers and pencils and whatever other instruments may be required,” says Merchant, adding that parents should also consider lighting, temperature and noise.

Whether it’s a desk in an office or in the living room, the same principles apply: “Make sure the surfaces are clean and there is a spot to place a notebook, laptop or whatever is necessary to accomplish the work,” says Rachel Rosenthal , owner of Rachel and Company, a professional organizing firm. “If the work is being done on the kitchen table, create a system that is easily transportable when dinner needs to be served.”

Take five for mindfulness

Before embarking on homework, Susan Crooks , a seventh-grade English language arts teacher at South Carolina Connections Academy recommends taking a few moments to relax and refocus.

“What if parents began a homework session with a five-minute mindfulness practice ?” she asks. “Even taking three minutes to settle the mind and breathe in and out can really help set the tone to begin.”

Map out a homework schedule on paper

“I tell parents to first sit down with their child and map out a homework schedule or an agenda on paper,” says Jennifer Hovey, owner of Huntington Learning Center in East Boise, Idaho. “Mapping out all the assignments and projects help students visually see what needs to be done and will naturally relieve anxiety. The assignments that are due soon are higher priority than the projects that are due further down the road. Tackling those high priority assignments will bring momentum and confidence in being able to tackle the assignments that are due later.”

Putting this schedule on a paper planner and not a digital device is key.

“Paper planners are crucial,” says Leighanne Scheuermann , a reading and learning specialist in Texas. “We know that physically writing down assignments and goals makes us all much more likely to keep track of them.”

Put small pieces together to add up to bigger projects

“Projects that have longer due dates and more components, like a book project for younger students or science experiments or research papers when your child gets older, can sometimes be overwhelming,” says Emily Levitt , VP of education at Sylvan Learning. “Break the projects into smaller pieces, showing your child the benefits of breaking out responsibilities over several days or weeks. The projects will be more manageable and also likely lead to higher grades — as there will be more time to review the work and make important adjustments.”

Should they tackle the easiest or toughest task first? It depends

As adults, we might find that tackling our most dreaded tasks first can help us conquer all the to-dos on our list and enhance our productivity , and this same approach can work with kids.

“Remember that we have a limited resource of time, attention, and energy. It's human nature to put off tasks we do not wish to do, and in organizing homework order, students often put off doing the task they least enjoy, but from a productivity standpoint, doing that task first conserves and manages energy best,” says Ketch. “The student will have a better chance of having sufficient energy to handle the subject matter that comes easier to them whereas if they put off the harder to them subjects (a natural reaction when under stress), they will have less energy to handle the toughest subjects and that increases stress.”

But Levitt actually recommends the reverse.

“Encourage your child to start with an assignment that seems easy,” says Levitt. “The feeling of accomplishment and confidence that results from getting one thing out of the way helps the homework session stay positive. Then, moving on to more complex work will be easier.”

It really depends on your child and their preferences, so your best bet is to try it both ways and see which works better.

Give your kid a brain-fueling snack

“Provide a healthy snack before homework or study time,” says Amanda Reineck, MSW, clinical utilization manager for Embrace Families . “Focus on brain-fueling options like a smoothie , hummus and vegetables, nuts and whole grains.”

New grade, new challenges? Talk it out and ask these 7 questions

It’s the start of a new school year, making now an ideal time to “sit down with your child to set expectations and prep [them] for what’s coming,” says Levitt.

You might also want to ask your young child a set of questions when they first sit down to embark on homework.

Dr. Gwendolyn Bass, the director of teacher leadership programs at the professional and graduate education arm of Mount Holyoke College, recommends asking the following:

• Before we even start the homework, tell me: how can I help you?
• Tell me what you did with this content/activity/book in school today?
• Do you like this problem-solving method/book/project? If not, what are you doing in school that you do enjoy?
• This looks different from what you brought home yesterday. Sometimes when someone gives me something new, I am afraid I won't be able to do it. Is that something you're feeling?
• What do you think the teacher wants you to get out of this assignment? How can you work with your teacher to make sure that you understand the homework?
• Just do as much as you can, and then let's make a list of questions you have about this assignment and you can bring them in to your teacher tomorrow. What are some of your questions?
• What can we do together when you're done with the homework?

Take breaks every 20 to 50 minutes

“Studies consistently show that studying in 20- to 50-minute segments is more beneficial than longer segments,” says Ketch. “Break briefly with something unlikely to distract in a way that will present a barrier. For example, walk a dog i nstead of check out Snapchat .”

Take note of the subjects/tasks your child struggled with and report to the teacher

“Write down the types of homework that really set your child into a tither,” says Merchant. “Share this information with your child’s teacher. There may be learning differences that warrant further discussions in order to get better, individualized support.”

If your child has an IEP (Individualized Education Plan) or a 504 Accommodation Plan, Merchant recommends making sure your child’s teacher has implemented it appropriately. “If so, maybe it needs to be updated based on more current observations you will share with the teachers,” says Merchant.

Guide them to solutions, but don’t problem solve for them

“As a parent, it is natural to want to help your student when you notice them struggling,” says Dr. Kat Cohen , founder of IvyWise. “ Instead of taking over , encourage independent work habits as early as possible. If your child comes to you with a question about their homework, help guide them towards potential solutions instead of just feeding them then answer. This could be as simple as working with them to find the information in a textbook or handout that answers their question or working through a challenging equation step-by-step. Be sure to set clear homework boundaries: the assignments are your student’s, not your, and they need to take ownership of that as early as possible.”

Levitt notes that “One of the most important things parents can do for their child is give them the space they need to grow, and to give them a break when they need it so that their minds are open to learning.”

To ensure that you’re giving your child enough space, ease up on constantly checking that they finished their homework as they get older.

“Gradually take off the training wheels and give your child more independence,” says Levitt. “Stop checking on homework completion, especially as they approach the end of middle school.”

Be your child’s strongest advocate and line up resources that can help

Though this story is directed at parents who are usually helping their kids with their homework, please know that if you’re a parent who isn’t available during homework time, there’s no shame in that. The most important thing — and this goes for the parents who can be around every evening, too — is as Reineck says, “to be your child’s strongest advocate.”

This means compiling resources you can tap should your kid show signs of academic struggle.

“Who else among the family connections could be helpful for certain subject matters?” says Reineck. Build that support system and reach out to your kids teacher and/or the school counselor if needed.

Additionally, if you’re struggling with your child’s homework, cut yourself some slack. This stuff is hard!

“It’s been a long time since most of us revisited algebra, geometry, or the fall of ancient Rome, and even if it hasn't been that long, who says we understood it the first time?” Morrison reasons. “When children need more than parental motivation to get their homework done, parents can feel like it's their responsibility to reteach themselves the subjects their child is struggling with, [but] this isn't realistic. How can we tutor them in something we don't understand? We can't. But we can get in touch with their teachers, let them know our child is having a hard time, and ask who may be available to help.”

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Is Homework Really Necessary?

Did you get all your homework done?

We’ve all heard that phrase one too many times before, and now it triggers your fight-or-flight response. Every waking thought is about an assignment you should be doing or that project you really should start but you just can’t bring yourself to face it. Is all this homework really necessary?  

Unfortunately, it just might be. Is the homework itself the problem, or is it the amount we end up with after classes are over for the day and your bed is looking really comfy? To figure all this out we have to remember why we get homework in the first place and what school would be like without it.  

In the very early 1900s, homework was actually considered unhealthy for children and was classified as child labor because it interfered with their ability to do chores around the house. The U.S. Department of Education called homework a tool for “boosting educational quality” when it was reinstated, and it became mandatory in 1986 after being rejected for so long, as recorded by the University of San Diego.  

It’s always good to look at the pros and cons of something when deciding how you feel about it. So, what does homework do for us? Quite a few things actually.  

First let’s address the elephant in the room. No one enjoys homework unless you’re a camp and outdoor adventure leadership (COAL) major. We all have something we would rather spend our time on; that’s just the way it is.  

However, when that test rolls around, most of us are glad we stayed late at the library until we understood what we were reading. According to the University of San Diego, students only absorb 50% of what they hear in a class lecture. If that’s all you had to learn from, keeping your GPA above a 3.5 would be considered a superpower.  

Whether we like it or not, homework helps us retain important information and truly grasp the concepts we are studying. Hearing about it once from your professor is great, but life as a college student is so busy that your chances of remembering everything you heard in all of your classes are next to none. Repetition is the key to retention, and other than experience training, studying the material you were given and doing your homework is how you’re going to graduate.  

Then why is it such a problem? Why is it affecting people so negatively? No degree is worth your mental health; it’s time to look at the cons of homework.  

I believe the real problem with homework is the amount of it. Yes, we need it to learn, but our brains can only handle so much at a time. Oftentimes the standard college workload demands that we push our minds past the limit or face a late penalty. This is what causes the exhaustion and resentment that we constantly push through for the sake of good grades and gold chords.  

 Studies conducted by the American Psychological Association and the U.S. Department of Health say shorter study sessions per day and more consistency over a longer period of time is the best way to retain information while not pushing yourself to your mental limit. However, there is so much to be done that studying for a mere three hours a day isn’t even practical.  

Students would actually be able to study in a healthy way and retain information long term if we were not assigned and asked to complete in one week what psychological studies say should take at least two.   

So, to answer the question: Yes, homework is definitely necessary. The real problem is how much we are required to process in such a short time.   

As finals inch closer by the day, make a point to take care of your mind and give yourself breaks not only while studying but also from other things that can cloud your brain like social media. Coping with huge workloads is a process, so make lists, take deep breaths and get to bed on time. We’re gonna make it; I promise.  

Barber is the off-campus news editor for the Liberty Champion

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Mom-Tested Tips for Ending Homework Battles

Posted: August 27, 2023 | Last updated: August 27, 2023

Back-to-school season means a return to making lunches, signing field trip permission slips, planning for 127 different spirit day outfits, and having to face the prospect of taming the homework beast once again. Although some experts think homework shouldn't exist at all, the truth is that most kids will face reading logs, worksheets, and book reports at some point in the near future. For some kids (and their VERY lucky parents), getting homework done is a "no drama for their mama" situation.

For other kids, on the other hand, the struggle is all too real.

There are lots of reasons homework can become a battle, so we are super grateful for the advice of other moms who've figured out how to end those fights before they start. Read on for some genius tips, including knowing when to call it quits and when to get some help.

More from CafeMom: Utah Middle School Faces Backlash Over Forcing Kids To Eat Bugs for Assignment

Different Kids, Different Needs

"My best advice is to remember what works for one kid might not work for the other. My son has always wanted to come home and do homework right away so he can get it over with and have the rest of the day to play. I learned the hard way that it is MELTDOWN CITY if my daughter doesn’t get a snack and some play time before she has to do homework. Set them up for success by figuring out what time of the afternoon/evening is best for them." – Martha D., Iowa

"Homework was so awful with my son. Like, it was taking him almost two hours to do basically two 3rd grade workbook pages and 20 minutes of reading and I was yelling, he was crying. It felt like ‘wait, this shouldn’t be so hard’ and that was accurate.

"The homework challenge was the thing that kind of clued us in that there was something more going on. He eventually got diagnosed with a learning difference and ADHD, so I think my advice is to ask for help if the level of homework battle is just beyond normal." – Lara R., Colorado

Make a Cozy Space

"I made a little homework nook in our kitchen with all the supplies they might need, comfortable chairs, and some snacks that they can help themselves to. I feel like it helps to have a welcoming space, and I usually make dinner when they are doing homework, so I can get that done but still be close by if they need help." – Jenny N., California

Watch the Screens

"Ugh. My kid’s school has them do homework on their school iPads, which I HATE. Last year it was taking my 2nd grade son forever to get his homework done and staying up too late, not getting chores done because ‘I still have homework, Mom!’.

"I eventually clued in to the fact that he was only spending like 40 minutes on homework and the rest of the time was screwing around on the iPad. Now he has to do his homework in the dining room, so I can see that he’s actually doing it. He gets done in less than an hour now." – KayCee C., Minnesota

Do the Hardest Thing First

"My suggestion is sort of basic, but it works for us: do the least fun/hardest thing first. Have a snack, do something relaxing, and then tackle the hard thing first when the brain is fresher. A lot less of battle when the worst is out of the way first." – Annie P., Arizona

Ditch the Log

"Can we just, as parents, band together and put an end to freaking reading logs? For whatever reason, all of our homework battles were around reading logs. As someone who loves reading, I hated seeing how much having to log it sucked the joy out of reading for my kids. So I just told my kids we’ll skip them.

They still read every day but not having to log it took the pressure off. It’s second grade! Who cares if they don’t turn in a reading log! Let that stuff go!" – Sasha W., Washington

More from CafeMom: Mom Puts Entire Family on 'Screen Detox' & Daughter Has Already Jumped 5 Reading Levels

"I’m strict about screen time (even for my high school kids) and our rule is simple: no screens until homework is done. We’ve done this since day one of having homework and the kids just know that we don’t budge on it. Consistency of expectations is the key!” – Laura W., Michigan

Homework Isn't Everything

"One of the things that helps our family is having a clear sense of how important homework is to us. The truth is that, with kids who are still in elementary school, it isn’t that important to us. Outside playtime, doing Legos, having fun with friends is more important to their development than homework is. So, I make it optional: they can do it when they want, if they want." – Blake E., Colorado

Always Start With a Snack

"My parenting lightbulb moment was realizing that fully 90% of my kid's post-school meltdowns (including homework ones) were because she was STARVING after school. I've started packing car snacks for her to eat on the way home and it makes everything easier once we get there." – Jamie J., Arizona

Be Realistic About Time

"Sometimes you have to give your kids permission to skip homework. Like, for us we are crazy busy on Wednesdays. We have soccer and church and there's just not time to do it. If I try to rush my 8 and 10 year olds to get homework done, everyone just gets stressed and cranky. I told their teachers that we just don't do homework on Wednesdays and they were fine with it. Saved so many tears!" - Melody D., Minnesota

Practice With a Planner

"Every Sunday, my son (he's 16) and I sit down and do his planner. He needs that extra support to help figure out how to break down doing bigger projects and how far in advance to start studying. Remember that teenage brains aren't fully developed! They don't just automatically know how to do tasks like this! Help them build the habit now so they are ready to do on their own in college." – Amy S., California

More from CafeMom: 5 Essential Conversations Moms Need To Have With Their Teens

Ask the Teacher

"When my first kid started getting homework, we were struggling. It was taking him at least two hours to get through all of it. In 1st grade! Of course there were awful meltdowns. I just assumed that was normal until I mentioned it to another mom and she was like 'uh, it should be taking like 15 minutes ..'

"I finally talked to his teacher and she confirmed that she'd never want him to be spending two hours a day on homework. We figured out some strategies around it and it got better. My advice: talk to the teacher if every home sesh is a struggle or if it is taking hours a day." – Kelly C., Indiana

"First, unless you are a single mom, don't act like a single mom! Dads need to help with the homework BS too! When we are gearing up for a homework fight, sometimes it's best if I tag out and he takes over. Some fresh parenting energy can help." – Olivia T., Rhode Island

Make Reading Fun

"For early grades, the bulk of their homework time is probably going to be reading, so finding ways to make that fun is clutch. We take reading outside or in the hammock, or even at a park just to mix it up." – Melissa H., Texas

Set a Timer

"With my ADHD kid, we do the 20-10-20 method and it helps reduce the tension a lot. He has to do 20 minutes of homework, gets a 10 minute break, and then another 20 minutes. We use a timer and he knows he can do whatever he needs to do in those 10 minutes. We say 'Anyone can do anything for 20 minutes' and I think that's true!" – Alice S., Minnesota

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Campus protests over the Gaza war

How student protests are changing college graduations.

Sequoia Carrillo

Graduates chant in support of Palestinians during the University of Michigan's commencement ceremony at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Saturday. Katy Kildee/Detroit News via AP hide caption

Graduates chant in support of Palestinians during the University of Michigan's commencement ceremony at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Saturday.

Many of this year's graduating college students were looking forward to their first formal commencement ceremony.

"I was a 2020 graduate in high school," says Isa Johnson, a senior at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Because of the pandemic, her high school graduation couldn't happen in person.

She was excited to finally get a traditional graduation this year, but the unrest on her campus has forced her to adjust her expectations.

After Jewish student organizations at USC raised concerns about valedictorian Asna Tabassum's past social media activity, the school cut Tabassum's speech from commencement. Other students rushed to her defense, and marched on campus in support. Eventually, the administration canceled the school's main commencement , citing safety concerns.

"We were finally going to be able to have... graduation," Johnson says, "and then within a whole week it was all taken away."

Columbia and Emory universities change commencement plans after weeks of turmoil

Across the country, protests on college campuses are running up against graduation season. Over the weekend, ceremonies at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and Indiana University Bloomington were marked by protests. Graduating students in Michigan interrupted the ceremony with chants, Palestinian flags and banners. At Indiana's commencement, a plane with a banner that read "LET GAZA LIVE!" flew overhead and a group of graduating students staged a walkout.

Schools with upcoming ceremonies are announcing extra safety precautions and venue changes. On Monday, following weeks of campus tensions, Columbia University in New York City joined USC in canceling its main ceremony . It's also moving smaller, school-based ceremonies off the main lawn, where protestors have been gathering, and into an outdoor sports venue. Also on Monday, Emory University, in Atlanta, said it was moving the ceremony to a venue in Duluth, Ga., over 20 miles away.

Johnson, at USC, says she understands why students feel the need to protest, but a lot of her classmates are upset about how their graduation has been affected.

"They're kind of just like, you know, 'I want a normal graduation.' I just wish things could be normal on campus. The atmosphere on campus isn't what it usually is," she says. "I think it makes a lot of people uncomfortable."

How campuses are preparing for graduation

After Oct. 7 – when Hamas attacked Israel, killing more than 1,200 people and taking at least 240 hostages – Israel retaliated by bombarding Gaza. That war has killed at least 34,622 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.

In mid-April, college students on campuses around the country began protesting in support of Palestinians. Students are calling for their schools to divest from companies that do business with Israel, among other demands. The movement has led to the arrest of at least 2,500 protestors, according to the Associated Press .

U of Mississippi opens probe over hostile protest that involved racist taunts

Students are organizing in highly visible spaces on campus, like the main quad of a school, and they're often opting for sit-ins rather than passing protests with a scheduled beginning and end. At several schools, students have formed encampments, pitching tents and living outside for days at a time.

At the same time, campuses are preparing to receive families eager to celebrate graduation.

At Cal Poly Humboldt in Arcata, Calif., the school is still cleaning up from a protest that ended with the student occupation of two campus buildings. The school says graduation ceremonies this coming weekend will be modified for security and held at three off-campus sites, as the campus remains closed.

At Wesleyan University in Connecticut, the school says it will not disperse the student encampment on the main lawn, so it may still be up during graduation at the end of May. At Harvard University, students are camped on Harvard Yard, but not in a place that would interfere with commencement later this month. Still, in a message to the school community on Monday, Interim President Alan Garber said students who continue to participate in the encampment "will be referred for involuntary leave."

At other colleges, administrators have negotiated agreements with protesting students. Protestors at Brown University recently agreed to clear their encampment in exchange for a divestment vote later this fall by the school's governing board.

NYC says half of those arrested at 2 pro-Palestinian campus protests were not students

Brown sophomore Daniel Solomon sits on the school's Student Organizing Committee on Antisemitism, and was involved in the negotiations.

"A big part of the discussion was not interrupting commencement and reunion weekend and to have a peaceful reading period, to have a peaceful finals period," he explains.

Other students have different priorities. NPR spoke with students who were part of the protests at UCLA and Columbia, two schools that saw confrontations between students as well as with police . Many didn't want to be named because they were concerned about doxxing, but they said they felt that raising awareness about what's happening in Gaza is more important than commencement ceremonies.

Not every campus is steeped in turmoil

Other campuses have seen little to no disruption from protests. At some of these schools, classes have wrapped for the year and students' minds are elsewhere. Charles Burns, a fourth year student at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, described a scene from his last ever undergraduate class:

"My professor asked us, 'OK, if any of you guys were at, say, Columbia or Brown or any of these campuses, how many of you would be participating in an encampment?' And... this is like a huge class – like 150 to 200 kids – maybe like 1 or 2 raise their hands."

Over the weekend, the University of Virginia's small encampment did get broken up by police and several people were arrested. Since then things have been quiet, and Burns is hoping they stay that way. As with Johnson at USC, this will be his first official graduation. In 2020, because of the pandemic, he had a drive-through high school commencement.

He's excited to get the full experience this year, and to have his grandparents make the trip from Kansas City to Charlottesville.

"Any kind of disruption to my college graduation... that would be a huge bummer. So I can only hope it doesn't happen. We'll see."

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A Manhattan community board member has been ousted after supporting a controversial resolution to have the city Department of Education review whether there should be a ban on transgender girls in school sports.

Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine refused to reappoint Craig Slutzkin to Community Board 5, which covers parts of the West Side and Midtown, where he had served since 2013.

A source close to the borough president said the trans issue was certainly a factor in not reappointing Slutzkin, whose term recently expired.

Levine’s office said it “does not issue public statements regarding individual appointments due to the myriad factors that contribute to these decisions.”

“However, we take a holistic approach and consider everything during this process,” the statement said.

Slutzkin voted for a resolution in March calling for a review of transgender athletes competing in girls sports as a member of a separate school board, Community Education Council 2, where he serves as secretary.

“I have been made aware that the motive invoked for my non reappointment may have been a vote that was recently taken on a CEC resolution. The resolution calls for dialogue on the difficult topic of transgender children in sports,” Slutzkin said in a statement Wednesday.

“I believe that it is incumbent on all of us to engage in difficult conversations with honesty and integrity,” he added.

“I want to make it clear that I harbor no bias of any kind, whether it is based on race, creed, gender, gender identity, gender expression or sexual orientation.”

The vote was a recommendation and non-binding in a public school system where education policy is set by the mayor and the citywide Panel on Educational Policy. 

Slutzkin noted he has served in many roles on CB5, including as secretary, most recently as second vice chairman and has headed several committees — and said he felt unfairly cancelled in the culture wars.

“My tenure has been exemplary and there is absolutely nothing about my service to the Board that would preclude a reappointment,” he said, noting he’d even been nominated to run for chair of CB5 and had strong support.

“I have earned the trust and respect of my colleagues. The Borough President’s decision to not reappoint me is incomprehensible and may be interference driven by political reasons,” Slutzkin said.

Maud Maron , who serves with Slutzkin on the CEC 2 and was one of the sponsors of the resolution urging a review of allowing trans youth to compete in girls’ sports, said Slutzkin’s removal from the community board was “shameful,” calling him “one of the hardest working community members I know.”

“MBP President Mark Levine is punishing parents for voting on a resolution that asked for a dialogue. His radical trans extremism brooks no compromise — or respectful dialogue,” she told The Post.

“MBP Levine routinely talks about the importance of Democracy but thinks all 50 odd members of CB5 need to agree with him about everything? Not very Democratic.”

Other elected officials defended Levine’s action and claimed that Slutzkin supported a resolution that discriminates against trans youths.

“Slutzkin’s decision to vote for a hateful and prejudiced resolution like #248 renders him unfit to serve on a Community Board, which plays such an important role in the governance of our city in many areas of New Yorkers’ lives,” said state Assemblyman Tony Simone (D-Manhattan).

The debate over transgender athletes competing in female sports has raged elsewhere, including in neighboring Nassau County.

Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman approved a contested executive order banning transgender athletes from competing against girls in county athletic facilities.

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Police Order U.C.L.A. Protesters to Leave Encampment

The protesters were told to clear out or face arrest. The order came a night after counterprotesters attacked the site.

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Jonathan Wolfe ,  Olivia Bensimon and Anna Betts

Jonathan Wolfe reported from the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles. Olivia Bensimon reported from the Manhattan campus of Fordham University. Anna Betts reported from New York.

Here is the latest on campus protests.

Police officers at the University of California, Los Angeles , on Wednesday ordered pro-Palestinian protesters to leave their encampment or face arrest after a night of chaos at the campus that saw violent clashes with counterprotesters.

A stream of students left the encampment after the warning, but hundreds remained inside, putting on helmets, masks and goggles. Dozens of police officers were stationed nearby, and lines of police cars are parked around the encampment, which had been the scene of wild clashes overnight when the counterprotesters attempted to breach it.

The university’s chancellor, Gene Block, had described the counterprotesters as “instigators” who attacked the pro-Palestinian encampment. Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles called for a “full investigation” into the “absolutely detestable” violence at the U.C.L.A. campus.

Elsewhere, police officers in riot gear arrested pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Fordham University’s Manhattan campus on Wednesday evening, the third university in New York City to face mass arrests in the past 24 hours as a surge of protests have put American universities on edge.

Police officers remained a jarring sight on the lawns and sidewalks of several American universities on Wednesday evening, including at Tulane in New Orleans, the University of Wisconsin, Madison and elsewhere.

Students at many other universities remained in protest encampments, indicating no intention of backing down, even as demonstrations spread to more campuses. The wave of student activism opposing the war in Gaza has posed a challenge for administrators who want to protect free speech rights while minimizing campus disruption.

More than 1,300 protesters have been taken into custody on U.S. campuses since 108 were arrested at Columbia on April 18, according to a tally by The New York Times .

Here’s what else to know:

Columbia’s campus remained closed to everyone but students who live there and employees who provide essential services, after officers in riot gear on Tuesday cleared a building that had been occupied for nearly a day. The school’s embattled president asked the police to remain on campus past graduation to prevent more conflict.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators also were arrested at City College of New York in Harlem on Tuesday night after some of them tried to take over an administrative building.

At Tulane , 14 people were arrested, administrators said, as state and local forces helped campus police disperse protesters. At the University of Arizona, campus police sprayed chemicals as they broke up a demonstration. And at least 17 people were arrested when officers cleared an encampment at the University of Texas at Dallas.

There were signs of de-escalation on some campuses. In Rhode Island, students at Brown University dismantled their encampment on Tuesday. On the West Coast, the police ended the eight-day occupation of an administration building at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt.

Jill Cowan contributed reporting from Los Angeles.

At Dartmouth College, 90 protesters were arrested for offenses including criminal trespass and resisting arrest, Hanover Police Department said in a statement early Thursday.

Emily Baumgaertner

Protesters at U.C.L.A. appear to be digging in, using large metal trash bins and wooden planks to form barricades.

Campus protests where arrests and detainments have taken place since April 18

Note: Data as of May 9, 2024 at 11:48 a.m. E.T.

By Leanne Abraham, Bora Erden, Lazaro Gamio, Helmuth Rosales, Julie Walton Shaver and Anjali Singhvi

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Jonathan Wolfe

Three hours after the police issued a dispersal order, police are beginning to surround the encampment at U.C.L.A., as protesters chant “Peaceful protest” and “We’re not leaving”

Dozens of police officers have exited a nearby building at the University of California, Los Angeles, and are lining up in front of the protest encampment. Demonstrators are at the barricades chanting “We’re not leaving.”

Jenna Russell

At Dartmouth College in Hanover, N.H., where a protest encampment went up on the campus green earlier in the evening, dozens of state police officers began removing protesters around 8:30 p.m., said Nicolás Macri, a Dartmouth senior and a member of the student government who observed the scene.

Shortly before 7 p.m., police officers stationed on a terrace at Royce Hall on the University of California, Los Angeles, campus announced three times that demonstrators had to leave the pro-Palestinian protest encampment or face arrest. A stream of students left, but hundreds are staying put and making preparations for any confrontation with the police, donning helmets, masks and goggles. Dozens of police officers are stationed around the encampment, and lines of police cars are parked nearby. Three police helicopters are hovering overhead.

Inside the pro-Palestinian protest encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles, nerves are high as demonstrators wait for an expected dispersal order. The smell of spray paint is everywhere as protesters spray messages like "divest" on plywood that has been nailed up around the encampment. Protesters are grouped around electrical outlets charging their phones, and making last-minute reinforcements to the barriers around the encampment.

Ann Cudd, the president of Portland State University, said in a message Wednesday evening that protesters occupying the campus library “must leave immediately.” Police have warned demonstrators, who have been preparing for a standoff, that anyone remaining inside may be forcibly removed.

A line to enter the pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles, has grown to hundreds of people, and more keep arriving. Organizers have been flooded with donations, and are now only accepting protective gear or building supplies. They made an exception when a supporter offered a fire extinguisher.

Ernesto Londoño

An agreement between Northwestern and pro-Palestinian demonstrators ends an encampment but draws criticism.

A deal struck by Northwestern University officials and pro-Palestinian demonstrators brought an end to a protest encampment on campus but drew harsh criticism from Jewish leaders and students on Wednesday.

The agreement , announced this week, included a promise by the university to be more transparent about its financial holdings. In turn, demonstrators removed the tent camp they built last week at Deering Meadow, a stretch of lawn on campus.

The university did not commit to divesting from companies linked to Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, a chief demand animating campus protests across the nation. But protest organizers at Northwestern said they saw transparency as a first step toward that goal.

School officials also agreed to support Palestinians who are facing hardship as a result of the Gaza conflict by creating two slots for visiting faculty members and full scholarships for five undergraduate students.

Supporters of the deal called it an example of constructive engagement that averted the escalation of tension that has played out at other universities.

“We see this as a watershed moment,” said Elizabeth Shakman Hurd , the chair of religious studies at Northwestern and a member of Educators for Justice in Palestine. “This is definitely a template that could be used elsewhere.”

But Jewish leaders, including officials from the American Jewish Committee , strongly objected to the agreement, saying it “succumbed to the demands of a mob.” Seven members of a Northwestern committee created to advise the university’s president on preventing antisemitism stepped down in protest on Wednesday.

Three Northwestern students who are Jewish filed a lawsuit in Cook County Circuit Court against the university, asserting that it enabled demonstrations that they described as a “dystopic cesspool of hate.” And the Northwestern chapter of Hillel said that the school’s deal had rewarded groups that have created a hostile environment on campus.

In an interview on Wednesday, Michael Schill, Northwestern’s president, said the agreement with pro-Palestinian activists had struck a reasonable balance between free speech and safety on campus. Asked whether the agreement could lead to the school divesting from companies with ties to Israel’s military campaign, Mr. Schill said he personally “would not be in favor of divestment, and that would be for anything, not just this particular issue.”

He added: “What we have created is an opportunity for students to engage in making their views known to the investment committee of the board of trustees.”

Paz Baum, a student who helped organize pro-Palestinian protests, said student activists were optimistic that the deal would ultimately lead to severing financial ties with companies that are profiting from the war.

“It sets us up really well to demand divestment in the near future,” said Ms. Baum, a member of Jewish Voice for Peace. “There are so, so many students and Northwestern community members who are going to continue this fight until we are satisfied.”

Administrators and student activists at Brown University struck a similar deal this week, averting the escalation that has played out at schools like Columbia University in New York and the University of California, Los Angeles.

Mr. Schill, who has led Northwestern since 2022, said he and his leadership team came close to deploying police officers to clear out the encampment after it was erected last Thursday. Ultimately, he said, they concluded that doing so would probably backfire.

“What’s happening at a lot of schools is sort of a game of Whac-a-Mole,” he said in the interview. “You arrest them, they come back, set it up, and it escalates and escalates and escalates.”

Mr. Schill said he was pleased that so far the tensions at Northwestern had not led to arrests. Some students, he said, will face disciplinary measures over their conduct in recent days.

“When expression turns into intimidation or harassment, there must be consequences,” he said. “Academic communities can’t exist with antisemitism, they can’t exist with anti-Islamic behavior.”

J. David Goodman

At least 17 people were arrested and charged with trespassing after tents were set up at a protest encampment at the University of Texas at Dallas on Wednesday, a university spokeswoman said in a statement.

“Individuals may peacefully assemble in the common outdoor areas of campus to exercise their right to free speech, but they may not construct an encampment or block pathways,” the spokeswoman, Kim Horner, said.

Olivia Bensimon

Inside the lobby of the Lowenstein Center at Fordham, custodial workers are now clearing out the encampment, dismantling tents and placing protesters' personal items in clear plastic bags. More than two dozen officers in riot gear were looking on.

N.Y.P.D. officers have entered the lobby of a building at Fordham University where protesters have set up an encampment and are making arrests.

The protesters who were arrested did not appear to resist, but stood facing the large crowd of protesters gathered outside the Manhattan campus as officers in riot gear put their hands into zip ties behind their backs.

Gene Block, U.C.L.A.’s chancellor, has finally addressed the violence that rocked the campus last night, describing the counterprotesters as “instigators” who attacked the pro-Palestinian encampment. “However one feels about the encampment, this attack on our students, faculty and community members was utterly unacceptable,” he said.

Mr. Block said that counseling services would be available and urged any students who experienced violence to report it to the university’s police department. “I can assure you that we will conduct a thorough investigation that may lead to arrests, expulsions and dismissals,” he added.

Shawn Hubler

Mayor Karen Bass of Los Angeles is calling for a “full investigation” into the “absolutely detestable” violence last night at the U.C.L.A. campus. “Those involved in launching fireworks at other people, spraying chemicals and physically assaulting others will be found, arrested, and prosecuted, as well as anyone involved in any form of violence or lawlessness,” she said.

Mary Beth Gahan

Police officers and sheriff's deputies, including some in riot gear, have cleared a protest tent encampment at the University of Texas at Dallas. At least 10 people were arrested.

About 30 police officers walked past the pro-Palestinian protest at Fordham’s Manhattan campus a few minutes ago and started putting riot gear on. The officers are wearing helmets and carrying batons.

A dozen members of Fordham’s faculty marched arm in arm and placed themselves between the students and the officers in riot gear. “Faculty to the front,” one shouted as they walked.

Olivia Bensimon and Lola Fadulu

Olivia Bensimon reported from Fordham’s campus in Manhattan.

Police enter Fordham’s Manhattan campus and arrest protesters.

Follow our live coverage of the college protests across the U.S.

Police officers in riot gear arrested pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Fordham University’s Manhattan campus on Wednesday evening, the third university in New York City to face mass arrests in the past 24 hours.

The officers, wearing helmets and carrying batons, entered the Leon Lowenstein Center, where earlier on Wednesday protesters had erected a modest encampment inside. The protesters who were arrested did not appear to resist, and they stood facing a large crowd of demonstrators while the officers put their hands into zip ties behind their backs.

The arrests came after nearly 300 protesters were arrested at Columbia University and City College of New York late Tuesday, Mayor Eric Adams said .

Custodial workers later cleared out a tent encampment that students had set up in the lobby of the Lowenstein Center. The custodians dismantled tents, picked up posters, swept up black, green, and red streamers and collected students’ personal items in clear recycling plastic bags. More than two dozen New York police officers in riot gear looked on.

The threat of arrests had hovered over the camps all afternoon, as a police drone buzzed and officers gathered nearby after demonstrators erected the tents inside the academic building. The police could not provide an exact number of students arrested, but confirmed that “multiple protesters” had been detained.

The protests at Columbia had been an inspiration at Fordham, one student said.

“When we saw what they did to Columbia, it really emboldened us,” Matthew Smith, 18, a freshman at Fordham’s Bronx campus who was among those protesting outside the Leon Lowenstein Center. “Seeing what the Columbia students went through, it’s inspiring.”

Some of the students inside the lobby said they had been suspended and brandished their suspension letters through the windows.

“You are suspended from your on-campus housing assignment, classes, final examinations, and all events including senior week and commencement,” Jennifer Campbell, the dean of students at the campus, wrote in the letter, which was obtained by The New York Times.

The letter also notified students that they were not permitted on Fordham property until further notice or pending the outcome of their case. People who were not current students and had received the letter were told they were not permitted to access school property until further notice.

Outside, protesters shouted that being suspended for supporting Gaza was “nothing short of an honor.”

School officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Earlier, nearly two dozen police officers blocked the protesters from occupying a nearby plaza and fenced the crowd onto the sidewalk.

A few faculty members looked on and voiced support for the protesters. Cynthia Vich, a professor in the modern languages department, said she was inspired by the students, and denounced the arrests at other colleges in the city.

“I’m so glad that they are expressing their solidarity, because I was waiting for them to do this,” Ms. Vich said, adding that the arrests at Columbia and City College were “out of proportion.”

Claire Fahy contributed reporting.

Sean Keenan

In Atlanta, dozens of pro-Palestinian demonstrators streamed into Emory University’s undergraduate admissions building on Wednesday afternoon. Most of them then left to congregate outside, and officers from the Emory Police Department are telling the few remaining protesters that the building is closed. Organizers have demanded that officers bring a school administrator to explain why they must leave.

It appears that all of the demonstrators have left the building, but some are pitching tents in front of the admissions office.

Fordham students who are part of an encampment at the school’s Manhattan campus say they have been suspended. The university administration did not immediately respond to requests for comment, but students brandished their suspension letters through windows of the school’s lobby.

Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs

The latest campus battleground is the flagpole.

As students continue to protest Israel’s assault on Gaza, the flagpoles at universities have become the latest point of conflict.

Students have raised the Palestinian flag at central locations on several campuses across the country, in some cases replacing American flags. This happened on Tuesday at the University of California, Los Angeles , and at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill .

In New York, Mayor Eric Adams expressed anger at the hoisting of the Palestinian banner at the City College of New York in place of the U.S. flag. “That’s our flag, folks,” Mr. Adams said at a news conference on Wednesday . “Don’t take over our buildings and put another flag up. That may be fine to other people but it’s not to me.”

Mr. Adams mentioned that his uncle died in the Vietnam War, and then added: “It’s despicable that schools would allow another country’s flag to fly in our country. So blame me for being proud to be an American.”

As university officials and police officers have moved to clear protesters from several campuses — more than 1,000 demonstrators have been arrested in less than two weeks — they have also undone the flag switches at some of them.

Lee Roberts, the interim chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, helped to return the American flag to the top of the pole at Polk Place on campus. Police officers were raising the flag even as other officers were pepper-spraying protesters, some of whom had been throwing water and empty water bottles at the police, according to The Daily Tar Heel , the school’s student newspaper.

“To take down that flag and put up another flag, no matter what flag it is, that’s antithetical to who we are, what this university stands for,” Mr. Roberts said, according to the newspaper.

The New York Police Department helped raise the American flag at City College late Tuesday night.

At U.C.L.A., a video showed a pro-Palestinian activist appearing to raise the Palestinian flag on scaffolding alongside a university building on Tuesday, as a police officer tried to detain him. The Palestinian flag was still flying there on Wednesday morning.

Jonathan Wolfe contributed reporting from Los Angeles.

Gov. Gavin Newsom of California just weighed in on last night’s violence at U.C.L.A. “The right to free speech does not extend to inciting violence, vandalism or lawlessness on campus,” he said in a statement. “Those who engage in illegal behavior must be held accountable for their actions — including through criminal prosecution, suspension or expulsion.”

About 60 students, faculty members and supporters have formed a line outside the pro-Palestinian encampment at U.C.L.A. to drop off supplies for the protesters. The line keeps growing. They are donating goggles, helmets, Vaseline, water, fried chicken, sleeping bags and more.

Students protesting outside Fordham say they think those in the encampment could face imminent arrest. They are urging people in the crowd to stay and observe the arrests.

Corina Knoll ,  Jonathan Wolfe and Emily Baumgaertner

Reporting from Los Angeles

Before the violence, U.C.L.A. thought a tolerant approach would work.

Follow our live updates on the campus protests .

It was an example of a tolerant campus, where a burgeoning pro-Palestinian encampment might be left alone even as student protesters were arrested across the nation. Free speech would be supported as long as things remained peaceful, officials said last week.

But by Wednesday morning, the peace at the University of California, Los Angeles, had been shattered. The university canceled classes for the day, pushed back midterms and scrambled to address an overnight eruption of bloody violence spurred by dozens of counterprotesters.

The melee, which continued for hours without intervention, was a display of fierce hostility as fistfights broke out, chemicals were sprayed into the air and people were kicked or beaten with poles. Many participants did not appear to be students.

“They had bear spray, they had mace, they were throwing wood-like spears, throwing water bottles,” said Marie Salem, 28, a graduate student and pro-Palestinian protester who was part of the encampment. “They set off fireworks toward our camp directly. And so, we were all hands on deck, just guarding our barricades.”

Now, there is widespread frustration over U.C.L.A.’s handling of the incident, and the university faces scrutiny for its delayed response to the drawn-out chaos. Many critics were incredulous that even after officers with the Los Angeles Police Department arrived, there were no arrests or suspensions.

Campus officials ordered protesters on Wednesday evening to leave the encampment or face arrest. A stream of students departed, but hundreds remained and donned helmets, masks and goggles. Dozens of police officers were positioned around the protest site.

In the early hours of Thursday the police started trying to break up the encampment. Their first few attempts to move in were turned back by protesters with improvised wooden shields and flashing lights. Eventually the police began dismantling the encampment’s main barricade and arresting protesters, while some demonstrators shouted “Don’t attack students!” and “Where were you yesterday?”

UNIVERSITY OF

CALIFORNIA,

LOS ANGELES

The school abides by a University of California policy that avoids involving law enforcement unless “absolutely necessary to protect the physical safety of our campus community.” The coming days will test U.C.L.A. as it navigates its ideals, the presence of city police newly embedded on its campus, and heightened tension.

“There’s a sense that the other side has immunity,” Ms. Salem said as a police helicopter hovered above. Around her, the landscape was littered with trash, splintered wood, trampled clothing. A large Palestinian flag fluttered in the air. Students and faculty members had been urged to stay away from the area.

“The general response from the student body is just frustration,” said Aidan Woodruff, 19, a freshman majoring in cello performance. He said he knew at least 50 students who had spent the past two days studying for midterms only to learn that the exams were postponed. The last week had already been a source of aggravation for those trying to focus on academics but confronted by protesters using metal gates and human walls to control access to campus walkways.

“There are definitely students who feel strongly about the causes, but a big part of it is people coming in from the general L.A. area and putting on a demonstration here that’s causing so much disruption,” Mr. Woodruff said.

Friction at the university, where Jewish activists have had a larger presence than at other demonstrations, had been simmering since Sunday when a pro-Israel rally planted itself about 20 feet from the encampment.

A day later, tension mounted after reports that a Jewish student had been blocked by the pro-Palestinian group as he tried to get to the nearby library. Campus police had to intervene when about 60 pro-Israel demonstrators tried to enter the encampment and a fight broke out.

By 4 p.m. on Tuesday, the administration’s approach abruptly shifted. Gene Block, the U.C.L.A. chancellor, declared the encampment an unlawful assembly and shut down the library and Royce Hall, the two main buildings near it.

“U.C.L.A. supports peaceful protest, but not activism that harms our ability to carry out our academic mission and makes people in our community feel bullied, threatened and afraid,” Mr. Block said in a statement. “These incidents have put many on our campus, especially our Jewish students, in a state of anxiety and fear.”

An alert informed students and employees that they could face serious sanctions, including discipline and potential dismissal for students, if they stayed.

At about 11 p.m., pro-Israel counterprotesters began trying to tear down an encampment barricade erected of metal gates, plywood and beach umbrellas, according to city officials. Shortly thereafter, they set off fireworks directly above the encampment. Videos on social media showed the firecrackers exploding near demonstrators and people spraying what appeared to be chemical irritants at one another.

Campus police were on the scene at that point and more arrived, along with university paramedics. But U.C.L.A. seemed to wait too long to call in the Los Angeles police, whose officers did not arrive until after midnight.

Just before 1 a.m. on Wednesday, Mayor Karen Bass’s office issued a statement that officers with the city would be responding to a request for support from the school. An hour later, she said on social media that the Police Department, which does not have jurisdiction over the campus, had arrived on the scene. Counterprotesters chanted “Back the blue.”

California Highway Patrol officers arrived on campus at about 1:15 a.m., according to Officer Michael Nasir, a spokesman.

By around 3:30 a.m., the authorities had wedged themselves into the fray and things began to de-escalate.

In a statement 12 minutes after midnight on Wednesday, Mary Osako, a vice chancellor at the university, said law enforcement had been immediately called for mutual aid support. “We are sickened by this senseless violence and it must end.”

But the U.C.L.A. Palestinian Solidarity Encampment, which says it is made up of students, faculty members and community members, condemned the school’s “pretense of student safety” in a statement, saying that campus police, external security and law enforcement failed to protect them from counterprotesters as “we screamed for their help.”

And Katy Yaroslavsky, the city councilwoman representing the neighborhoods around U.C.L.A., called the response from its campus police “too slow and ineffective in protecting student safety.”

“In failing to control the situation, students and others on campus were left vulnerable to violence that has no place on our college campuses,” she said in a statement.

While the mayor called for a full investigation and the president of the U.C. system ordered an independent review, the authorities combed through footage recorded on cellphones and additional cameras. Others took it upon themselves to identify the worst of the perpetrators by circulating footage with magnified stills.

Major Jewish and Muslim organizations condemned the attack. The greater Los Angeles area is home to the second-largest concentration of Jews in the nation, with significant Jewish communities around the Westside region, which includes U.C.L.A.

Beverly Hills, for instance, has one of the largest communities of Iranian Jews in the nation, while the Fairfax District has such a large community of Orthodox Jews that the city created a special, no-touch “sabbatical” streetlight for them in the 1970s so that they would not have to disobey religious edicts against activating electricity.

The Jewish Federation Los Angeles said it was “appalled” at the violence that occurred on campus, and that the counterprotesters did not represent the Jewish community or its values. The federation criticized Mr. Block, the U.C.L.A. chancellor, and the school’s administration for creating an environment that has made students feel unsafe, and called on him to meet with Jewish community leaders to discuss safety measures.

Hussam Ayloush, the director of the Greater Los Angeles Area office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, urged Rob Bonta, the state’s attorney general, to investigate what he characterized as a lack of response by the campus police and the Los Angeles Police Department.

“U.C.L.A. and other schools must ensure that students can continue to peacefully protest the genocide in Gaza without facing attacks by violent pro-Israel mobs,” Mr. Ayloush said in a statement.

The extreme shift on campus has been hard to comprehend for many, and students who watched what happened on social media or were in touch with those on the ground found it devastating to watch things escalate.

“I think I had allowed myself to be lulled into a false sense of good vibes, and that people were handling themselves,” said Benjamin Kersten, 31, an art history doctoral candidate who has been organizing with the Los Angeles and U.C.L.A. chapters of Jewish Voice for Peace. He noted that the university’s hands-off approach ended up being a double-edged sword.

On Wednesday morning, Bella Brannon, the editor in chief of the university’s Jewish newsmagazine, was trying to make sense of the footage she had seen.

“What happened was clearly and flatly wrong, immoral, deliberate acts of violence against students,” she said. “I am especially worried that their actions will cloud dialogue with the pro-Israel community.”

Ms. Brannon, 21, is majoring in public affairs and the study of religion and has friends who are protesting in support of Palestine. In recent days, she has been disturbed by the protests on both sides of the conflict.

“The college campus is a nonstop hub for discourse, even if it’s incendiary. I can’t go home and take a bath and relax and forget about it,” she said. “For us, there is no separation between school and home — it’s always everything, all at once.”

Reporting was contributed by Jill Cowan , Shawn Hubler , Livia Albeck-Ripka , Claire Fahy , John Yoon and Yan Zhuang .

Zach Montague

Asked on Wednesday if President Biden supported the deployment of police officers at schools in New York, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, told reporters that students who had occupied campus buildings were going beyond their right to peaceful protest. “Forcibly taking over buildings is not peaceful — it’s just not,” she said.

The crowd outside Fordham’s Manhattan campus now includes about 80 people, many of them students. There are also a few faculty members who came to show support for the encampment. “I’m inspired by my students as always,” Cynthia Vich, a professor of Spanish and comparative literature, said. “And I’m so glad that they are expressing their solidarity, because I was waiting for them to do this.”

Around 9 a.m. in Los Angeles, the pro-Palestinian encampment at U.C.L.A. stirred to life after a night of violence. About two dozen protesters began moving through the encampment. Some wore blue gloves and picked up trash while others folded clothes that had been trampled the night before. A police helicopter hovered overhead. A large Palestinian flag, erected in the center of the camp, swayed in the wind.

Lola Fadulu and Santul Nerkar

Santul Nerkar reported from right outside Columbia University.

After a tense night with over 100 arrests, Columbia’s campus remains closed.

Nearly 300 demonstrators at Columbia University and City College were arrested on Tuesday night as police officers in riot gear raided the campuses after administrators at the schools requested help, Mayor Eric Adams of New York said during a news conference on Wednesday.

Officials said 173 people were arrested at City College and 109 were arrested at Columbia. It was still unclear on Wednesday how many among the arrested were students and how many had come from outside the schools and were not permitted on campus, but officials said the protest movement was led by “ outside agitators .”

“They are attempting to disrupt our city and we are not going to permit it to happen,” Mayor Adams said of the demonstrators.

The police arrived on campus on Tuesday night after both schools sent letters requesting help, officials said. “The events on campus have left us no choice,” Nemat Shafik, Columbia’s president, wrote in a letter to a Police Department official on Tuesday. The officers will remain on Columbia’s campus until May 17, two days after commencement.

Police officers made arrests and removed banners from Hamilton Hall, a Columbia administrative building that protesters had recently occupied. The building has a history of student takeovers , including one in April 1968 during protests over the Vietnam War. Officials said the building’s doors had been barricaded with vending machines, couches, metal chairs and the demonstrators themselves, who were pushing against the doors and throwing objects.

On Wednesday morning, the campus was still closed to everyone except for students who live there and employees who provide essential services. A protest encampment near the building had been cleared, leaving behind square indents where tents had once sat.

Outside the campus gates near Hamilton Hall, the scene resembled what it did before the protests — but with dozens of media members stationed around the gates and across the street, in front of Columbia’s law school.

Students, staff members and others with badges were checking in on both the school’s Amsterdam and Broadway entrances, much like they had during the past week.

Johnny Rosen, a junior studying financial economics at Columbia, said the protests on campus, including the occupation of Hamilton Hall, had been “terrifying.” Mr. Rosen, who is Jewish and was out of town for the Passover holiday, said the university hadn’t moved quickly enough to quell the protests.

“I don’t see any other option,” Mr. Rosen said of the university’s decision to request the police to enter the campus.

Meghnad Bose, a graduate student at Columbia Journalism School, said that as a student and as a reporter covering the protests, he found the last few days to be “tiring.”

“We feel the university could have done better on a number of fronts,” he said.

The arrests come as college administrators across the country are grappling with how to tame a pro-Palestinian protest movement while also protecting free speech and academic freedom. Police officers made arrests early Wednesday in other campuses, including at the University of Arizona and Tulane University in New Orleans.

A crowd of over 50 people has gathered near Fordham University’s Lincoln Center campus in Manhattan, south of Columbia University, to support an encampment that Fordham students set up overnight. “We demand divestment,” the crowd chants. “Fordham, Fordham you can’t hide.”

Matthew Smith, 18, a freshman at Fordham’s Bronx campus, said he came first thing this morning when he found out about the encampment. “When we saw what they did to Columbia, it really emboldened us,” he said. “Seeing what the Columbia students went through, it’s inspiring.”

Claire Fahy

After a night of violent clashes between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian protesters, U.C.L.A. told students in an email on Wednesday that all classes were canceled for the day. Police officers would remain stationed throughout campus, the email said, and the two main buildings beside the encampment — Royce Hall and Powell Library — would remain closed.

Emma G. Fitzsimmons ,  Jeffery C. Mays and Dana Rubinstein

Eric Adams seizes role as the face of the police crackdown on student protests.

Eric adams says ‘outside agitators’ co-opted campus protests in n.y.c., without providing evidence, mayor eric adams said that the protests on campuses in new york city had been infiltrated by “outside agitators” seeking to sow chaos..

There is a movement to radicalize young people, and I’m not going to wait until it’s done and all of a sudden acknowledge the existence of it. After speaking with them throughout the week, at their request and their acknowledgment that outside agitators were on their grounds training and really co-opting this movement — at their request, we went in and conducted an operation to allow Columbia University to remove those who have turned the peaceful protest into a place where antisemitism and anti-Israel attitudes were pervasive. Approximately 300 people were arrested at Columbia and City College. We are processing the arrest to distinguish between who were actual students and who were not supposed to be on the ground. As we pointed out yesterday, they are attempting to disrupt our city and we are not going to permit it to happen.

Less than 18 hours after protesters at Columbia University took over Hamilton Hall, Mayor Eric Adams convened reporters at Police Headquarters to deliver a warning. The situation on campus, he said, would not be allowed to keep escalating.

“This must end now,” he said.

Less than three hours later, police officers entered the campus in riot gear, arresting 119 people on Tuesday night.

Nearly a mile away at the City College of New York, officers made even more arrests, and top police officials took down a Palestinian flag and hoisted an American flag in its place, a symbolic moment that the Police Department amplified on social media.

The police action came after a series of behind-the-scenes discussions where Mr. Adams and police officials tried to persuade university leaders that it was time for them to intervene. A top police official, Kaz Daughtry, said on Wednesday that the arrests came after “we were finally given permission.”

For much of the weekslong protest at Columbia, university leaders have remained in the background, making much of their public pronouncements through campuswide advisories.

In their absence, Mr. Adams, a Democrat and former police officer, has forcefully stepped in, embracing a role that adheres to his law enforcement background, his reputation as a mayor focused on reducing disorder and his strong support for Israel over many years.

Mr. Adams relied on support from Orthodox Jewish voters in a close race for mayor during the 2021 Democratic primary. An emotional speech he made not long after the Oct. 7 attacks in Israel won praise from the country’s supporters, and the mayor has continued to condemn the attacks.

Some Democrats, including President Biden, have been more reluctant to call for crackdowns on the protests , and left-leaning Democrats in New York called the mayor’s approach “shameful” on Tuesday.

But as pressure to intervene began to rise from Republicans and even some Democrats, including former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo , Mr. Adams — who is likely to face a contested Democratic primary for re-election next year — quickly adopted a more aggressive stance.

On Friday, Mr. Adams said in a radio interview on WABC that he had met with several college presidents and told them: “Soon as one tent comes up, take that tent down. Don’t allow it to spread, because what you will find is that it will continue to multiply and spread and bring a level of disorder.”

By Tuesday night, administrators appeared to have followed his advice.

A phalanx of police vehicles made its way up Broadway. Police officers in riot gear climbed ladders and entered Hamilton Hall. And at City College, officers arrested more than 170 protesters.

On Wednesday, Mr. Adams made the rounds on morning news shows, eager to become the public face behind the police intervention.

On MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” the mayor made clear that he had urged Columbia to take action.

“It was clear after I was briefed probably two days ago — the extent of the outside agitators,” he said, adding: “I really encouraged them to look into this, for the safety of students.”

At a morning news conference at Police Headquarters, the mayor again alluded to outside agitators and sought to cast himself as a force against disorder.

“They are attempting to disrupt our city and we are not going to permit it to happen,” Mr. Adams said, praising officers for using restraint during the arrests.

He added that he was proud of the police officers who had raised the American flag, saying that the city was “not surrendering our way of life to anyone.”

“It’s despicable that schools would allow another country’s flag to fly in our country,” said Mr. Adams, who has made it a frequent practice to hoist other countries’ flags over one of the city’s most historic parks. “So blame me for being proud to be an American.”

Blame did come from left-leaning Democrats. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrote on X that Mr. Adams’s approach was “the opposite of leadership and endangers public safety,” calling it “a nightmare in the making.”

Ana María Archila, a director of the New York Working Families Party, said that the police response on Tuesday was “reckless, escalatory and put the entire university community in harm’s way.”

“This is a shameful day in our city’s history, and one that will not be forgotten,” she said.

Shahana Hanif, a City Council member from Brooklyn who is a chairwoman of the Council’s Progressive Caucus, visited the encampments on Columbia’s campus last week and said the description from police and the mayor was wrong. She added that the mayor’s comments could alienate another important voting bloc: young New Yorkers.

“We’re witnessing this mass mobilization of young people” who are tired of having their concerns about what’s happening in Gaza ignored, Ms. Hanif said.

The Progressive Caucus also criticized efforts by the police to prevent reporters from visiting the scene as a “threat to our very democracy.”

Camille Rivera, a progressive Democratic consultant, said that Mr. Adams most likely believed that the protests were harming his message that he was restoring order to the city.

“He’s a Democrat who is supposed to believe in the right to protest, but he sounds like a Republican,” she said.

Doug Muzzio, a political scientist and former professor at Baruch College, said the mayor’s choice to adopt a “tough guy” image would alienate some, but that it might be a wise political choice.

“He had to know he had to piss off a lot of people, but he made the judgment that more people would have favored what he did, and I think he was right,” Mr. Muzzio said.

Gov. Kathy Hochul, a fellow Democrat, defended the police action, saying that “free expression has its limits.”

Though she acknowledged that students demonstrating in solidarity with Gaza had a right to protest, she said that students who were not protesting had the right to be free from harassment. “They should not be living in fear because you’re claiming an exercise of your rights,” she said on Wednesday.

The police response was professional and fair, she said, adding: “It could have been far worse.”

To temper the perception that the police used unnecessary force against the students, Mr. Adams and police officials sought to amplify the notion that the protests were being orchestrated by outside activists. They have not named the outsiders who they say were involved and declined on Wednesday to say how many of the protesters who were arrested were not affiliated with the colleges.

Rebecca Weiner, the deputy commissioner of the Police Department’s counterterrorism bureau, said at the news conference on Wednesday that police had seen a “normalization and mainstreaming of rhetoric that is associated with terrorism.” She also noted that the wife of a person who was convicted of providing material support to terrorism had attended the protests last week — though she was not present on Tuesday and has not been accused of wrongdoing — and said she would not want her “influencing my child.”

Police officials on Wednesday also displayed large chains that were used to block doors, and said they were evidence that “professional” activists were influencing student protesters. (Similar chains were sold by Columbia’s public safety department for $100 as a bicycle-theft deterrent.)

As Mr. Adams concluded his news conference on Wednesday, new protests were already forming at sites throughout the city, including at Fordham and Columbia .

Maria Cramer contributed reporting.

An earlier version of this article misidentified the school where police officials replaced a Palestinian flag with an American flag. It was City College, not Columbia University.

How we handle corrections

Ali Watkins

At Tulane, 14 people are arrested after police clear an encampment.

The police clear pro-palestinian protest at tulane university, more than a dozen people were arrested at an encampment on the campus of tulane university in new orleans, the university said..

[drum beating] “Free, free Palestine.” [drum beating] “Free, free Palestine.” “This is the Louisiana State Police. I order all persons so assembled to immediately and peaceably disperse — which means leave the area.”

An encampment of protesters at Tulane University in New Orleans was cleared and at least 14 people were arrested early on Wednesday, the university said, after officers from three law enforcement agencies ordered the group to disperse.

The campus police, the Louisiana State Police and the New Orleans Police forcibly removed the demonstrators. It was not immediately clear how many protesters were present, but two of the demonstrators who were arrested were students, the university said in a statement, adding that the encampment was an “unlawful demonstration.” Tulane is also investigating reports that faculty members participated in the protest.

The university said the encampment was formed on Monday, and campus police officers also made arrests that evening. Six people, including one student, were taken into custody that night under charges that included trespassing, battery on an officer and resisting arrest, according to the university, which also issued seven suspensions.

According to the student newspaper, The Tulane Hullabaloo, the campus police cordoned off the encampment on Tuesday, but did not try to disband it until early Wednesday.

Hiba Yazbek

reporting from Jerusalem

‘Thank you, American universities’: Gazans express gratitude for campus protesters.

Thousands of miles away from the campus protests that have divided Americans, some displaced Palestinians are expressing solidarity with the antiwar demonstrators and gratitude for their efforts.

Messages of support were written on some tents in the southern city of Rafah, where roughly a million displaced people have sought shelter from the Israeli bombardment and ground fighting that Gazan health officials say have killed more than 34,000 people.

“Thank you, American universities,” read one message captured on video by the Reuters news agency. “Thank you, students in solidarity with Gaza your message has reached” us, read another nearby.

Tensions have risen at campuses across the United States, with police in riot gear arresting dozens of people at Columbia University on Tuesday night and officers across the country clashing with pro-Palestinian demonstrators who had erected encampments and seized academic buildings at other institutions. The protesters have been calling for universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel, and some have vowed not to back down.

The protests have come at a particularly fearful time in Rafah, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel vowing to launch a ground invasion of the city to root out Hamas battalions there despite glimmers of hope for a temporary cease-fire.

Palestinians “are very happy that there are still people standing with us,” said Mohammed al-Baradei, a 24-year-old recent graduate from the dentistry program at Al-Azhar University who spoke by phone from Rafah.

“The special thing is that this is happening in America and that people there are still aware and the awareness is growing every day for the Palestinian cause,” he added.

Akram al-Satri, a 47-year-old freelance journalist sheltering in Rafah, said Gazans were “watching with hope and gratitude the student movement in the United States.”

“For us this is a glimmer of hope on a national level,” he added in a voice message on Wednesday.

Bisan Owda, a 25-year-old Palestinian who has been documenting the war on social media, said in a video posted to her more than 4.5 million Instagram followers that the campus protests had brought her a new sense of possibility.

“I’ve lived my whole life in Gaza Strip and I’ve never felt hope like now,” said Ms. Owda.

Nader Ibrahim contributed reporting and video production from London.

Emma Fitzsimmons

Mayor Eric Adams is speaking at a news conference. He said that about 300 people were arrested on Tuesday night at Columbia University and at the City College of New York after the protests became a “place where antisemitism and anti-Israel attitudes were pervasive.”

At their request, we went in and conducted an operation to allow Columbia University to remove those who have turned the peaceful protest into a place where antisemitism and anti-Israel attitudes were pervasive. Approximately 300 people were arrested at Columbia and City College. We are processing the arrests to distinguish between who were actual students and who were not supposed to be on the ground.

Adams and New York Police Department officials are praising themselves for using restraint in yesterday’s campus arrests. The mayor said that outsiders are radicalizing students, “attempting to disrupt our city and we are not going to let it happen.” City officials and police have not named the outside actors they blame for the unrest.

We’re learning more about the clashes at U.C.L.A. Late last night, a group of about 200 counterprotesters began storming the pro-Palestinian encampment on campus and tried to pull apart its wooden pallets and metal barricades. The two sides threw objects, got into fistfights and sprayed chemicals. This went on for several hours, according to a New York Times journalist who was there.

Police officers arrived to chants of “Back the blue” from counterprotesters and “Free Palestine” from the encampment. At around 3:30 a.m., officers wedged themselves between the groups and the violence began to de-escalate.

California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt, said that its campus would remain closed as employees cleaned up garbage and graffiti following the clearing of a protest encampment . Campus police had arrested 32 people, including 13 students and one faculty member, the university said in a statement late Tuesday.

State and local police were helping campus police disperse protesters at Tulane University, the New Orleans Police Department said. Keith Brannon, a spokesman for the university, confirmed early Wednesday that law enforcement officers had entered the campus.

Six people have been arrested and seven students suspended for participating in an unlawful demonstration, the university said . Parts of the campus remained closed, and the administration was investigating reports of faculty members who had participated in the demonstration. But the university said: “The overwhelming majority of these protesters are unaffiliated with Tulane.”

University of Arizona police said they were spraying chemical irritants and ordering crowds on campus to disperse early Wednesday in response to an “unlawful assembly.” The university said that its president had directed university police “to immediately enforce campus use policies and all corresponding laws without further warning.”

Los Angeles Police Department officers have arrived at U.C.L.A., the mayor, Karen Bass, said in a social media post just before 2 a.m., calling the violence on campus “absolutely abhorrent and inexcusable.” The L.A.P.D. said that because of “multiple acts of violence” within the protest encampment, it was responding “to restore order and maintain public safety.”

John Yoon ,  Yan Zhuang and Jonathan Wolfe

U.C.L.A. officials ask police to help after clashes at a protest encampment.

Counterprotesters storm u.c.l.a. pro-palestinian encampment, violence broke out as counterprotesters attempted to pull down barricades at a pro-palestinian encampment at the university of california, los angeles..

“Free Palestine. “Watch out. Watch out.”

Administrators at the University of California, Los Angeles, called in law enforcement officers on Wednesday after violent clashes broke out at a pro-Palestinian protest encampment, a university official said.

The Los Angeles police were “responding immediately” to a request for support from the university, according to the office of the Los Angeles mayor, Karen Bass. The police had arrived at the campus by about 1:50 a.m., local time, Ms. Bass said on social media .

Late Tuesday, a group of about 200 counterprotesters began storming the pro-Palestinian encampment on campus and tried to pull apart its wooden pallets and metal barricades. The two sides threw objects, got into fistfights and sprayed chemicals in clashes that went on for several hours, according to a New York Times journalist who was there.

Police officers arrived to chants of “Back the blue” from counterprotesters and “Free Palestine” from the encampment. At around 3:30 a.m., officers wedged themselves between the groups, quieting the unrest.

The clashes followed several violent confrontations between pro-Palestinian and pro-Israeli protesters on the campus in recent days. Dueling protests have been particularly intense at U.C.L.A., where Jewish activists have had a larger presence than at other campus demonstrations. On Monday night, a fight broke out between two groups of protesters after about 60 pro-Israel demonstrators attempted to enter the pro-Palestinian encampment.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the violence on Wednesday morning.

The university had been among the most tolerant as pro-Palestinian protests and encampments grew at universities nationwide. But in a sharp turn on Tuesday, U.C.L.A. administrators declared that the encampment there was unlawful and threatened to suspend or expel any protesters who were students.

Videos posted to social media show clashes on Wednesday involving protesters, firecrackers exploding near groups of demonstrators and people spraying what appeared to be chemical irritants at one another. Some people were also seen tearing down metal barricades surrounding the encampment.

The U.C. Divest Coalition at U.C.L.A., which has been organizing pro-Palestinian protests at the university, said on social media on Wednesday that students at its encampment had been attacked by “fireworks, tear-gas, pepper spray and more.”

“Horrific acts of violence occurred at the encampment tonight, and we immediately called law enforcement for mutual aid support,” Mary Osako, a vice chancellor at the university, said in an emailed statement early Wednesday.

“The fire department and medical personnel are on the scene,” she added. “We are sickened by this senseless violence and it must end.”

The Los Angeles Police Department said that there had been “multiple acts of violence within the large encampment” on the campus. In response to a request from the university, the police officers were assisting campus police and other agencies “to restore order and maintain public safety.”

Ms. Bass had spoken to both Gene Block, the university chancellor, and Dominic Choi, the Los Angeles chief of police, according to a social media post by Zach Seidl, Ms. Bass’s chief spokesman. Ms. Bass said in a later post that “the violence unfolding this evening at UCLA is absolutely abhorrent and inexcusable.”

Violence erupted early Wednesday at the protest encampment at the University of California, Los Angeles, said Mary Osako, a vice chancellor at the university.

“Horrific acts of violence occurred at the encampment tonight and we immediately called law enforcement for mutual aid support,” she said in an emailed statement. “The fire department and medical personnel are on the scene. We are sickened by this senseless violence and it must end.”

Connor Michael Greene

The encampment on Columbia's campus has been removed. Instead of tents and supplies, you can now see the the green lawn again, with stains where the tents once were pitched. It's been a few hours since police arrested and removed dozens of protesters. There are about 30 police officers next to Pulitzer Hall, while others work to remove banners from the facade of Hamilton Hall, which was occupied by protesters.

Liset Cruz ,  Erin Nolan and Bernard Mokam

The N.Y.P.D. arrests protesters at City College’s campus in Harlem.

Police officers arrested dozens of pro-Palestinian demonstrators at City College of New York in Harlem late Tuesday night, as clashes over the war in Gaza continued to escalate on campuses across the country.

Earlier in the evening, protesters tried to take over an administrative building at City College. Police officers chased the crowd, which had been running toward the Howard E. Wille Administration Building just after 7:30 p.m. Most of the demonstrators returned to their nearby encampment.

The police first made arrests at near West 139th Street and Amsterdam Avenue in Harlem. Demonstrators could be heard screaming and cursing at the police, and an officer could be heard ordering the crowd to back away as protesters were arrested. Moments later the police warned everyone to leave the area. They then moved onto the campus and arrested people in the encampments.

The arrests came as officials at nearby Columbia University asked the New York Police Department to clear a building that had been occupied.

Officials at the University of California, Los Angeles, have declared a pro-Palestinian encampment illegal for the first time, and warned protesters that they will face consequences if they do not leave.

The U.C.L.A. Palestinian Solidarity Encampment, which says it is made up of students, faculty members and community members, called the declaration cowardly and said that it did not plan to disband.

The situation at City College in Harlem has been escalating for hours after police prevented protesters from taking over a building. Since then, police have arrested dozens and have now moved in to the encampment, where they are making additional arrests.

Columbia’s president asks the police to stay on campus through mid-May.

Columbia University asked the New York Police Department in a letter on Tuesday to clear a building occupied by pro-Palestinian protesters and encampments, and asked that the police remain on campus until at least May 17, after commencement.

President Nemak Shafik requested the N.Y.P.D.’s assistance in a letter that was released after police entered Hamilton Hall and arrested protesters that had occupied the building on early Tuesday. Columbia’s commencement is currently scheduled for May 15.

By late evening, dozens of police officers had arrived, climbed through windows on campus and arrested protesters who had occupied a building since early Tuesday. Much of the campus had been cleared of people, although dozens of protesters still chanted outside of its gates.

Tent encampment

Cleared by early

Hamilton Hall

Occupied by

early Tuesday

Police first entered

through an upper

floor Tuesday night

New York City

Amsterdam Ave.

Wednesday morning

Occupied by protesters

early Tuesday morning

West 114th St.

Source: Google Earth

By Leanne Abraham, Bora Erden and Lazaro Gamio

Dr. Shafik said in the letter that “the takeover of Hamilton Hall and the continued encampments raise serious safety concerns for the individuals involved and the entire community,” adding that “these activities have become a magnet for protesters outside our gates which creates significant risk to our campus and disrupts the ability of the University to continue normal operations.”

A decision earlier this month to bring police onto campus to clear a tent protest led to sharp criticism from some students and faculty. But Dr. Shafik said on Tuesday that she was left with “no choice.”

“With the support of the University’s Trustees, I have determined that the building occupation, the encampments, and related disruptions pose a clear and present danger to persons, property, and the substantial functioning of the University and require the use of emergency authority to protect persons and property,” she wrote.

She continued: “With the utmost regret, we request the NYPD’s help to clear all individuals from Hamilton Hall and all campus encampments.”

In the letter, Dr. Shafik stated that in the early morning of April 30, a group of individuals entered Hamilton Hall “for the purpose of occupying the building,” and though the building was closed at the time the students entered, an individual hid in the building until after it closed and let the others in.

“We believe that while the group who broke into the building includes students, it is led by individuals who are not affiliated with the University,” the university president said. “The individuals who have occupied Hamilton Hall have vandalized University property and are trespassing.”

Dr. Shafik also mentioned the continuing encampment on the West Lawn of the Morningside Heights campus that has been there since April 19, as well as an additional encampment that appeared on Monday night.

“After more than a week of discussions with representatives of the group engaged in the West Lawn encampment, we reached an impasse on Sunday, April 28,” she said. “The group was informed that they are not permitted to occupy spaces on campus, are in violation of the University’s rules and policies and must disperse.”

She said that all University students in the West Lawn encampment were informed Monday morning that they would be suspended if they did not disperse by 2 p.m. that day and that participation in other campus encampments was prohibited. The students still in the encampments are suspended, she said.

In the letter, Dr. Shafik added that she requested that the Police Department “retain a presence on campus through at least May 17, 2024 to maintain order and ensure encampments are not reestablished.”

Jonathan Wolfe and Benjamin Royer

U.C.L.A tells protesters to leave the encampment on campus.

Officials at the University of California, Los Angeles, declared a pro-Palestinian encampment illegal for the first time on Tuesday night and warned protesters that they faced consequences if they did not leave.

It was an abrupt turn at a campus that had been among the most tolerant in the nation, abiding by a University of California practice of avoiding law enforcement action unless “absolutely necessary to protect the physical safety of our campus community.”

After protesters established the encampment on Thursday in the shadow of Royce Hall, university officials did not intervene and said they wanted to support free speech rights while minimizing campus disruption.

But patience appeared to run out after violent confrontations in recent days between pro-Palestinian demonstrators and Israel supporters that required the campus police to intervene. Administrators also took issue with instances in which protesters used metal gates and human walls to control access to campus walkways and entrances, videos of which had circulated on social media.

In a statement on Tuesday, Gene Block, the chancellor, called such tactics “shocking and shameful” and said that protesters who engaged in such behavior could face suspension or expulsion.

“U.C.L.A. supports peaceful protest, but not activism that harms our ability to carry out our academic mission and makes people in our community feel bullied, threatened and afraid,” Mr. Block said. “These incidents have put many on our campus, especially our Jewish students, in a state of anxiety and fear.”

In a statement, the U.C.L.A. Palestinian Solidarity Encampment, which says it is made up of students, faculty members and community members, called the university’s declaration on Tuesday night a “cowardly intimidation tactic” and said it did not plan to disband.

“This repression tactic is a continuation of a long history of attempts to shut down student activism and silence pro-Palestinian voices,” the group said. “We will not leave. We will remain here until our demands are met.”

Jewish activists have had a larger presence at U.C.L.A. than at other campus demonstrations in California, and dueling protests have been particularly intense.

On Sunday, the Israeli American Council, which has denounced pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses as “overtly antisemitic,” hosted a rally at U.C.L.A. that drew thousands of people. Organizers set up a stage and a large screen near the pro-Palestinian encampment and then led prayers, hosted speakers and welcomed performers who sang Israeli pop songs.

But tempers also flared, with shouting matches and scuffles between the two sides, including altercations after an encampment barrier was breached.

“U.C.L.A. has a long history of being a place of peaceful protest, and we are heartbroken about the violence that broke out,” Mary Osako, the university’s vice chancellor for strategic communications, said in a statement that day, vowing to increase security.

On Monday night, another fight broke out between two groups of protesters after about 60 pro-Israel demonstrators attempted to enter the pro-Palestinian encampment. Campus police officers had to break up the dispute.

Pro-Israeli demonstrators began arriving at the encampment almost immediately after it was first set up. For the past several days, they have waved Israeli flags, spoken through megaphones, played music through loudspeakers and held up images of some of the hostages captured by Hamas on Oct. 7.

On Tuesday, a large screen near the encampment played footage from the Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel. At noon, a plane flying a “Jewish Lives Matter” banner circled the campus.

Many Jewish groups say the campus protests have created a climate that is hostile toward Jewish students. The Israeli American Council has responded by holding “support rallies” across the nation similar to the one Sunday at U.C.L.A., including events in Atlanta and Orange County, Calif., on Wednesday.

Asher Taxon, a freshman at U.C.L.A. who is Jewish, said the Sunday rally had given him a much-needed boost.

“It was great, it felt like we’re still here and that they can’t get rid of us,” Mr. Taxon said. “It was nice seeing other Jews and Israelis singing and dancing and showing that we are supported.”

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators said Tuesday that the daily counter-demonstrations at U.C.L.A. had been emotionally and mentally exhausting.

The “actions and behavior of these counterprotesters is indicative of the treatment of the people on the ground in Gaza,” said Kaia Shah, a researcher and a recent U.C.L.A. graduate. “What this has done to the people in our encampment is made them even more passionate about our cause.”

Jacey Fortin

Brown students end their encampment as the university agrees to talk divestment.

As pro-Palestinian protests continued to escalate across the country, officials and students at Brown University set a rare example on Tuesday: They made a deal.

Demonstrators agreed to dismantle their encampment at Brown, which had been removed by Tuesday evening, and university leaders said they would discuss, and later vote on, divesting funds from companies connected to the Israeli military campaign in Gaza.

The agreement came even as scenes of chaos continued to overtake U.S. universities, with protesters at Columbia in New York and Portland State in Oregon occupying buildings, and demonstrators at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill replacing an American flag at the center of campus with a Palestinian one.

More than a thousand people have been arrested over the past two weeks after a crackdown on a pro-Palestinian encampment at Columbia in New York resulted in a cascade of student activism across the country.

At Brown, in Providence, R.I., students began pitching tents on the main campus lawn on Wednesday. Many said they would stay until they were forced out, adding that they were concerned about trying to end the violence in Gaza — not about violating university policies.

After discussions with administrators, Brown Divest Coalition, along with other pro-Palestinian organizations including Jewish Voice for Peace, said in a post on Instagram that they had reached an agreement with the university, which “would not have been possible without the hard work of university encampments across the country, whose collective power has forced university administrators to acknowledge the overwhelming support for Palestine on their campuses.”

The agreement lays out a series of steps for the months ahead:

In May, five students will meet with five members of the Corporation of Brown University to argue for divesting funds from companies connected to the Israeli military.

In September, Brown’s advisory committee on resource management will be expected to advise the university on the same issue.

In October, the committee’s recommendation will be brought to the corporation for a vote.

“Although the encampment will end, organizing to ensure that the Brown administration fulfills our calls to act on divestment will continue until the corporation vote in October,” the Brown Divest Coalition said in a statement on Tuesday.

“This feels like a real moment of realizing our collective power,” said Rafi Ash, a sophomore at Brown who participated in the protests. “This is something that demonstrates that the mobilization of the student body can force the university to listen.”

Administrators and student activists at Northwestern University struck a similar deal on Monday.

A spokesman for Brown, Brian Clark, said that divestment was not as simple as some students might perceive, though. The university doesn’t invest its endowment directly, he said. Instead, it relies on “external specialist investment managers, all with the highest level of ethics and all whom we believe share the values of the Brown community.”

Administrators said in a statement that it would still hold disciplinary proceedings related to the encampment, which broke the university’s rules. Reports of harassment and discrimination will also be investigated, the statement said.

“The devastation and loss of life in the Middle East has prompted many to call for meaningful change, while also raising real issues about how best to accomplish this,” Christina H. Paxson, Brown’s president, said in the statement, adding that she did not condone the encampment and had been concerned about inflammatory rhetoric.

“I appreciate the sincere efforts on the part of our students to take steps to prevent further escalation,” she said.

Gaya Gupta contributed reporting.

Bryan Anderson

Reporting from Chapel Hill, N.C.

Tensions rise at U.N.C. Chapel Hill after dozens of pro-Palestinian demonstrators are detained.

Protesters at u.n.c. break through barricade in the center of campus, protesters at the university of north carolina, chapel hill, clashed with police officers working to restore an american flag that the demonstrators had replaced with a palestinian one..

“Back up.” “You’re hurting students for a flag?” “Don’t hurt students.” “Hey, hey, hey, hey — what is wrong with you?” “Don’t hurt students.” “Disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest. Disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest. Disclose, divest, we will not stop, we will not rest. [crowd boos] “Fascists.”

Pro-Palestinian demonstrations at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill turned chaotic on Tuesday, hours after dozens of students were detained for refusing to leave an encampment they had set up over the weekend outside Wilson Library on campus.

By the afternoon, several hundred students had broken through the barriers keeping them out of the encampment, erupting in chants of “Free Palestine” and calling on the university to divest from investments that support Israel.

The scene escalated when protesters replaced an American flag in the center of campus with a Palestinian one, and demonstrators reportedly threw water on law enforcement officers and school officials as they tried to restore the U.S. flag back onto the pole.

“It’s clear that the university has chosen its side,” said Shahad Mustafa, a 21-year-old senior who began to flee as officers approached the flagpole. “They are choosing to still support Israel regardless of what their students are saying. They are showing us that they are willing to use violence and willing to lie.”

School officials said 36 protesters had been detained after they were given until 6 a.m. on Tuesday to clear out from the encampment or face possible arrest, suspension or expulsion. Of those, 30 people, including 10 university students, were cited for trespassing and released. Six more, including three students, were booked on trespassing charges at the county jail.

On the other end of the quad on Tuesday afternoon, a handful of students held Israeli flags. Trevor Lan, a Jewish student who stood with the group, told The News & Observer of Raleigh, N.C., that the encampment and recent protests marked the first time he felt “threatened” on campus.

“They took down the U.S. flag,” Mr. Lan told the news outlet. “For those of you who didn’t care about Israel and didn’t care about the Jewish people, look at it now. This is what this evolves into.”

The clashes at U.N.C. Chapel Hill came as North Carolina was still mourning the death of four officers who were killed a day earlier trying to serve arrests warrants to a man in Charlotte, about two hours away, in what was one of the deadliest shootouts for American law enforcement in recent years.

Four other officers were also wounded. Gov. Roy Cooper of North Carolina had ordered all flags at half-staff to honor the slain officers.

On Tuesday, the lieutenant governor, Mark Robinson, criticized the U.N.C. Chapel Hill protesters and their actions as “nonsense” that “should never have happened to begin with.”

“Especially after what we saw last night in Charlotte, our police officers need to be treated with respect, and lawlessness needs to end,” said Mr. Robinson, a Republican who is running for North Carolina governor .

More than 1,000 demonstrators have been arrested on campuses across the country after a crackdown on demonstrators at Columbia University in New York this month spawned a wave of activism at universities.

Anna Betts contributed reporting.