Teenagers speak out on school boredom, need for real-world skills

A new survey from EdChoice, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that advocates for school choice, reveals teens’ perspectives on school and what they think is needed to reduce chronic absenteeism.

Most teens like school, but one in five reported being chronically absent, missing an average of 15 days a year.

Teens point to school being stressful, pointless and boring as the top reasons for chronic absenteeism.

The majority — 68% — reported that school is boring.

“If I’m an educator, I’m thinking, how can we get teens more interested in school?” noted Colyn Ritter, senior research associate for EdChoice.

“I think that they would just like to see some of the priorities change, and some of the current systems that schools have in place may be revamped to more modern needs of teens,” Ritter said.

The survey shows teens feel that more focus on building life skills could help reduce absenteeism.

“Thinking back to my own high school experience, we often joked, why do we need to learn? There’s such an emphasis on things like the Pythagorean theorem and other things that will stick in our mind,” Ritter explained. “We never learned how to change a tire, we never learned how to start a bank account, we never learned how to balance a checkbook.”

The survey shows that teens also want better access to mental health services. The good news is most teens feel their teachers prepare interesting lessons, and most don’t think school is a waste of time.

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