second semester seniors

I have been a second semester senior for a few months now. We all have. I have stopped being stressed about anything at all school related, and as a result you would expect that my grades would have plummetted, or at least begun a steady descent. My 3rd quarter grades arrived yesterday, and while one class dropped by a half grade (photography of all things, only because i am running late on my subculture assignment), my grades as a whole (as a function of GPA for lack of anything more substantial) have not dropped and in fact because I added another class have even improved slightly.

You would expect that the effects on my grades of my changed attitude would be minor and might not even have taken effect yet, since I had all of first semester to create a very strong buffer. The most interesting piece of information can thus be seen in my second-semester-only class, Comparative Government, which is far from an easy class. I have not found it easy at all, and in fact my teacher calls it the “anti-second-semester-senior” class. This is the first time I have taken an AP history class, and the requirements in terms of work and quality of analysis are far beyond anything I have experienced before in the humanities. Nonetheless, I wasn’t about to let it stress me out, though it very likely would have in the environment of last year. I gave an earnest effort while in class, and I did the reading, but I did not stress myself out (although I did put in a couple of hours of studying for the test). In the end, as it turns out, my more relaxed take on the class did not have any ill effects, and in fact probably proved an improvement. My grade in the class was more than satisfactory, and I am now able to tell any uncertain college that I can also handle an upper level history class if it comes down to pursuing a waitlist.

This is not a phenomenon isolated just with me. Many of my classmates that have become second semester seniors have actually improved their grades, and those whose grades have dropped were usually only by a single half grade in a single class, often balanced by improvements in other classes. We have had more fun this semester than we have throughout our high school experience, and our academics haven’t suffered.

There are two explanations to this. The first is that we have learned to manage our time so effectively that we are now able to portion a smaller amount of time to schoolwork and use that time far more effectively. This is certainly a part of it, but I think that we would have learned those skills even if we weren’t in the high pressure environment of Harvard Westlake junior and senior year. The second, and far more poignant, is that perhaps it is unnecessary for us to have this mentality through much of high school that every single grade we get on even the smallest quiz or homework assignment must be perfect. This is utterly ridiculous, and whats more, all the extra stress it generates steals energy we could be using far more productively (sharpie rockets anyone?). It is important to care about school, but to be so overconcerned about every little assignments only ends up detracting from the quality of life.

I knew this from an intellectual perspective even last year, but I never really understood it until I experienced this last quarter of the school year. And so I feel that I must make it infinitely clear that this concept that kids at Harvard Westlake are instilled with that every action must be geared towards getting into a good college (there are people that have asked me what they need to do to get into X college, a fundamentally silly question) is utterly wrong. Furthermore, it is making kids, especially those experiencing the horrors of junior year at this point, far less happy than they would otherwise be. HW is a place of near infinite opportunity. Those opportunities are great and should be taken advantage of, but they should never decrease the enjoyment of our time on this earth. There is a balance to be struck: try your hardest, but do not worry so much about failing. It is all a matter of attitude, and I am thankful to finally realize even this late that there is no reason to worry too much. Don’t let the neverending tests and essays get you down. They mean less than their teachers attempt to make you believe.

{Need to Show: Ben}