ASI Soft Sculpture and Pillow Art Project Workshops are a means to educate the public that 90 percent of teens are sleep deprived and help students use art as as tool for activism. Sleep deprivation causes significant health costs in the areas of mental health, learning and behavior, substance use and abuse, higher risk of obesity, and dependence on sleep and anxiety medications.
Learn more from “5 Scary Health Effects Of Sleep Deprivation During The Teen Years” article https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/7-scary-ways-sleep-deprivation-affects-teen-physical-and-mental-health_us_55a7bd07e4b04740a3df0fb3
And additional information on the importance of sleep for teens:
https://sleepfoundation.org/sleep-topics/teens-and-sleep
“Though sleep is arguably most critical during the teen years, teenagers are the least likely of any age group to be getting sufficient rest. About 87 percent of American high school students are chronically sleep-deprived,” according to a 2006 survey from the National Sleep Foundation.
While the National Institutes of Health estimates that teenagers need at least nine hours of sleep per night, only 9 percent of high school students are actually meeting these recommendations. “Even more alarming is the fact that a whopping 20 percent are getting by on less than five hours per night.” Increased use of technology and cell phones in bedrooms by youth of increasingly younger ages is predicted to cause increased sleeplessness.
Pillows and soft sculpture art give students a means of expressing their thoughts on the health costs of sleeplessness and what they can do about it to take charge of their lives.
One of our middle school students has been sleeping for over a year on a sofa with her sister who keeps her up at night from kicking. The pillow project will hopefully be a means to discuss this issue with her family.