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What did you teach? The reason I ask is, some subjects really are improved by repetition and rote memorization of certain aspects until they become second nature. Also, for kids who are planning to attend college, they will need to learn study skills if they are going to make the most of it. When I taught general education science to college kids, a goodly portion of my job was directing freshmen to the tutoring office to learn basic study skills, and there were indeed some students who had absolutely no experience of taking notes from a lecture, reviewing for exams, using the library, mnemonics tricks, etc. Some didn't make it through their first year. Of course, if you argue that not everyone who ends up in college really should be there, I'd certainly agree!
Incidentally, most white-collar folks I know who are currently employed do, in fact, work 50-80 hour workweeks. Mostly because they are picking up all the projects for their colleagues who have been "downsized"...
I'm home sick at the moment, only instead of resting and getting well, I'm supposed to be working on a manuscript. Such is life in the modern world.
Edited to add: Oh yeah, 40 lbs. of books. Agree that that is too much. Can the relevant homework not be photocopied from specific pages? I am old enough that when I was a kid, our homework consisted of mimeographed purple pages to take home, and maybe a couple of small books if we had a reading assignment. Essays were written in the school library during study hall, because reference materials weren't allowed out of the library. Don't remember hauling around an awful lot of books until college.