Sarah Muschiol
Staff writer
It shouts from every corner on campus. It haunts students like a nightmare and keeps them from sleeping, before they have even begun – finals.
They keep coming back every semester like sticky gum under your shoe, you know it’s there anywhere you make a step, but the best thing is to just pretend its non-existent. It would be nice, if it was just as easy with the most dreaded time of the semester.
Finals mean for every student stress, sleepless nights of studying and vulnerability to all the sicknesses floating around, which no one can afford to catch before the big “F”-day.
Every semester it seems like a new surprise that every professor asks for a ten-page essay and a comprehensive two-hour exam worth 50 percent of your final grade. This raises the question, why do students have to carry all the pressure to condense a semester’s worth of work into just a two-hour period?
The pressure is there and the snowball-effect begins rolling after too much caffeine and deprived sleep: the last exam ends in an unwinnable war with your heavy eyelids and the only thing to remember the next morning is: please let me never have to go through so much stress again, and a promise to oneself that next semester will be different.
Every semester starts out with a positive attitude of acing your classes, keeping up with your reading and homework, studying before your tests, so the hump of failing or passing a class does not have to be made at final judgment day.
But suddenly it hits one all out of the blue, the stress, the stacked cups of cheap instant coffee spilling over your desk and hidden five-hour energy bottles under every seat and pillow.
So why do we not change the procedure? Why do finals have to be so important and always end in a big mess every semester?
The most ironic thing of all, professors and staff despise the last week of the semester just as much as any student. For professors it means to read and grade all these exams and final papers and in the end wishing, they only would have demanded eight pages from each student.
But even if every professor would have decided to teach less material and require a shorter research paper, it would have not changed the outcome. Finals week will always be stressful, and if it were only classes that were taught instead of testing and grading, who would remain on campus?
Probably nobody would still attend classes, if it wasn’t for final grades, which can change the final outcome of all grades. For the eager and zealous students on campus, who were working hard all semester, a bad day at the end of the semester can make the difference in between an A or a B.
For students who struggle through college, a final exam means earning a passing or failing grade, but how much does this system really contribute to a successful learning environment? All semester long students fight through every test, quiz, exam and homework to maintain a good grade.
The argument is, students who had been doing well during the semester, will also do fine on the final, while students who have been struggling receive a last chance to improve their grade. So optimistically spoken finals week is not about stress and frustration, but only a significant opportunity to improve yourself.
That said, we can be proud of the most attentive and ritualistic tradition of colleges in the country and the so often repeated phrase, “Good luck on your finals!” I am sure we all need it.