Todd vs High School

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I was so exhausted when I came home I fell asleep on the recliner at 6:30 and just got up now at 5:00 AM. I have a ton of homework to do before school I’m going to start on right after this post. I’ve found I have two different times I can fall asleep. Either between 1 and 3 AM, which obviously isn’t good because I need to be up at 7:00 AM for school, or immediately when I get home where I pass out from exhaustion.

One thing I’ve noticed is how much more productive I am when rested. I spent my study halls in school yesterday trying, trying, trying, to get my homework done, but it just wasn’t happening because my mind was so ready to shut down. Now that I actually caught up on a little sleep, it should be a breeze. Knowing this, I don’t even try to fight staying awake when I get home and just make sure to set an alarm so I’m up in time to do my work.

Seeing how important sleep is, I don’t understand how culturally there’s this weird attitude towards it. It’s like we’re supposed to be ashamed of wanting and needing to rest. Every school I’ve ever been to has kids who just don’t naturally get to sleep at a time that’s in line with the school schedule and who suffer for it. I’d go as far to say as a lack of sleep is the primary cause of my failings in school the first time around. There’s tons of evidence to support that teens need a different schedule than what the school system is on.

What’s nice is the principal at my new school gets that, and believes school should start later. We start at 8:15 which is actually pretty late by most high school standards, but still earlier than most any adults jobs start. The problem is for school to start later the entire city school system would have to change their busing times. This is something I’d love to see happen.

Read the link below, it explains it in pretty straightforward terms:

http://www.cehd.umn.edu/pubs/ResearchWorks/sleep.html

NOTE: It’s amazing how much easier it is to write these when the other option is doing homework. I have no excuse now for not having any of my work done today.

Welcome to Todd Gallagher's official book site! Hi, I'm Jill! Todd is a best-selling author who has re-enrolled in high school this semester in Pittsburgh. I will be making the posts he sends me between school, soccer, and sleeping.

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About Todd Vs. High School
Todd Gallagher is a critically-acclaimed author, ESPN writer, '95 high school grad, and current Trinity Christian High School student. He is very thankful to Trinity for admitting him as a 33-year-old writer researching a book.

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Investigation and Research
In Todd’s first book Andy Roddick Beat Me With A Frying Pan, he tackled compelling questions and stopped at no boundary to find answers. Todd Vs. High School answers questions, too, except instead of questions like Could a morbidly obese goalie shut out an entire NHL team?", these questions will be about "the best years of our lives."

Naturally, the only way to find out those answers was to re-enroll in high school for one semester, leave L.A., and move back in with his parents in Pittsburgh, which is exactly what Todd did.

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A High Schooler Full Of Questions ('91-'95)
In the 90's, Todd hated high school so much he was kicked out of two of them. He graduated as the only National Merit Scholar with a 1.7 GPA. He received a 4% in Spanish.

A High Schooler Answering Questions (Fall '09)
Like the Andy Roddick book did with sports, Todd Vs. High School answers peoples' burning questions. Teens' burning questions from, "Why is getting your high school diploma so important?" to "How can I get invited to parties?" to "How do I hide a fart in class?". And adults' burning questions, like "If you had the chance to do high school all over again, could you do it right?" and "Should I spy on my teen's AIM chats?"

Questions About High School?
Please email us any questions you have. Todd will report his findings in his weekly video blogs and also in his book.

Press
Because of his unique interest in answering questions, The LA Times once referred to him as "Plimpton on Acid".

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