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American schools long were (in)famous for handing out very little homework. Probably because the teachers hated grading it. Then, in the 80's and 90's, the blame for the relative lack of education of American students compared to European and (especially) Asian students got pinned on "not enough time in school and not enough homework". Articles contained lines like "Japanese students in school 16 hours a day, 6 days a week, 60 weeks a year, and are assigned 25 hours of homework a day; why can't American students do the same?". There was some movement towards a longer school day but inertia and teacher's unions won out in most districts. But more homework? Hey, that's easy. Just assign more of the same crap being assigned before. Make it either easy to grade (like math problems) or impossible to objectively do so (so the teacher can make something up). Doesn't do any good, does much harm.
As for the school/prison comparison -- well, in schools you get to go home evenings and weekends. And the violence between students is less often allowed to escalate to rape and murder.
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