Student exhaustion. Not sleep deprivation, exhaustion — built from multiple losses of sleep in the night — is a fairly prominent issue facing society.

I guess the better way to put it is- you know there's a problem when nearly 20% of teens every day are falling asleep on cold, hard desks.

As it turns out, teenagers need around nine hours of sleep a night. With schools starting on average at 8 a.m. every day, students must wake up earlier. In order to prep for the commute, take a bath, dress up, eat a solid breakfast and drive down to the school (before the bell) — we are talking wakeups that could fairly easily hit the 5-6 a.m. benchmark. Nine hours in, that means that the time to go to bed needed is 9 p.m.

You read that correctly. 9 p.m.

Keep in mind that teenagers usually can't sleep well before 11 p.m. thanks to a couple of hormonal changes in what I like to call the Circadian Rhythm. Why are teens waking up so early? The answer is simple. Moolah. Money. The big bucks.

Or more precisely, saving it by using only one bus for a group of students, rather than three, forcing high schoolers to wake up first and elementary students last.

You know, the group of kids that actually do wake up earlier in the morning.

Of course — as usual with our education system — there's more to this dish than just the salt. More classrooms are offering AP classes now, which means more homework. Some kids will have clubs to run through as well, as well as being able to maintain their bodies through a sport or exercise.

Coming home and then having to do homework for the rest of the day means that they don't get much of a mental break to recollect themselves, run more on less sleep and, inevitably, begin to burn fuse full of pure exhaustion developed by a worn out brain that hasn't had the proper time to develop itself. All without decent mental breaks to help recover them in the process.

Let's also keep in mind that somehow we should have to get kids ready to be responsible when they leave school. And literally halting their development in the name of saving money doesn't really do that. Pair that with our broken education system and there is only one thing left to say.

We're leaving our kids fused out.

Shackling them in chains of broken tests. Chaining them to the gravity of the chair for hours upon hours, telling them what to think instead of how to think, fueling them with the idea that they have to break down to win and devilishly distorting the way that nature has wanted us to think.

We are leaving them bent to break, with no return for them other than a diploma folding them in lifelong debt.

We are teaching them ideas of life that are not true. That creation and innovation are not nearly as useful as an A. That you need permission form others to go ahead. That another will think for you and follow their rules.

In the name of money for the institution, without the benefits it has promised for the American people — wealth.

The education system isn't a system. It's a delusional path of rocks that eventually hurl the broken feet of those walking into a swimming pool without teaching kids how to swim, but how to get to the next rock.

So the truth is very blunt. A parental society that focuses on optimizing the child for such a blasphemous system of treachery is just as responsible as the society governing it. Kid's shouldn't be tired to the bone when they wake up for school. They shouldn't be throwing up useless information.

They shouldn't be thinking linearly. That's definitely a path, but a path to self-destruction.

So it's time to take it into your own hands. Begin teaching your kids the life skills they truly will need. How to think. How to reach out and talk to people. How to invest time and money. How to build character for success.

It's time that we teach our children to be healthy adults, not college graduates. There can be a big difference between the two.

So, parents, it's time to do your homework.