Today I went to Billy's Downtown Diner in Allentown with my mom and our family friends that I haven't seen in forever. My Aunt Katherine is a crazy sixth grade teacher who loves drama and gossip and delivers the funniest jokes and insults I've ever heard and I love her absolutely to death, and her daughter Rachel has basically been my friend since we were in the womb. We were seated at our table at 11:15 or so, and somewhere between 11:30 (when they showed up) and 1:00 (when we all left) the topic of school came up. Now, this is obviously not a surprise. Especially when both the adults at the table were sixth grade teachers that shared a wall for the majority of my life. They asked how my Junior year was going and I slowly started to realize that the answer was... pretty good.
I was shocked that I actually meant it. I've had some pretty high ups and some pretty low downs so far this year, but school wise? Its going great. Everyone always says how tough and stressful your junior year is supposed to be. I was told countless times to savor every moment of freshman and sophomore year, but to be completely honest sophomore year was way harder. I was stressed out all the time, and my grades were no where near where they should've been. My time management skills were no where to be found and neither was my confidence or motivation when it came to school work. Its not as though my classes are any easier this year, I'm taking two APs and two art classes with a heavy workload, and the majority of my first period class is me going home and teaching myself the entire unit. I don't feel as though my time management skills have improved and I'm out of the house doing social things a lot more than last year, and yet my GPA and overall achievement in my classes is a lot better.
I think I'm waiting for the stress to hit me, that feeling of an overload of work and the terrifying panic that comes after I don't get it all done. I just hope it doesn't eventually hit. I hope junior year ISN'T the hardest year of high school.
I totally agree with this! I found that sophomore year has been the hardest year for me so far, which I think is due to chemistry. My GPA this past semester was the highest it's ever been, and my classes are more difficult this year. I'm not sure why that happened, but I'm not complaining.
ReplyDeleteI feel the same way, even though this year has been tough everything's been really enjoyable. This is one of the first years that I've actually enjoyed what I'm learning, so it's a nice change from freshman or sophomore year.
ReplyDeleteThat's something that actually came up a few weeks ago for me. I realized that this semester is actually the best one of all my High School life. I know it is supposed to be hard, but that's usually because it's what colleges usually look at, so the stress of doing better than usual is what makes it really hard. In reality, I think it's easier because you have much more freedom in the classes you want to take. I got to choose the Science and English I wanted and I don't have to take history. Hopefully the rest of the year goes as smoothly as the beginning.
ReplyDeleteMy junior year has also been going pretty good so far! Having study halls/cyber classes definitely helps me with the workload, and having more freedom with what classes I am taking makes learning easier. I am hoping it stays this way throughout the rest of the year, but I don’t have any study halls next semester so we’ll just have to wait and see.
ReplyDeleteIt oddly feels as if it should be harder. For some reason this year is so much easier than I expected it to be. I think the reason that it feels so much easier is that I have more freedom to pick classes that enjoy and want to put effort into. I’m just hoping it stays the same.
ReplyDeleteI am really happy you're doing so well Meili, you deserve it. But not going to lie, my junior year has been super hard so far but I feel it is cause my time management, motivation, and work load got a lot worse compared to my sophomore year. I am kind of terrified I peaked in sophomore year...but it's okay!! I am soooo happy for you though.
ReplyDeleteEverything you are saying is spot. on. in my opinion. As we come into the second quarter of the year, I find myself still waiting on that dreaded "worst year of high school" feeling. It feels kind of like somebody threw a hand grenade into a room, but we've been waiting for it to go off for three months now. I personally am having one of the best years of school I've ever had, and maybe that is because sophomore year was such a shot to the foot. Whatever the case, I am perfectly happy riding this wave for as long as I can.
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