“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are,” President Theodore Roosevelt said.
During finals week, many students feel the pressure to reach success. However, it is always important to remember the real reason that finals exist: to show what students have learned in class. Learning is not meant for the short term, but rather education is meant for the long term acquisition of knowledge. Finals help prove the success of that goal. However, many students are conflicted regarding the necessity of finals and how to study for them. Coping with such a stressful time of the year can be difficult, but students work even harder in order to maintain their grades and be successful in the academic world.
Study Techniques
Students have many different ways of studying–they enjoy getting creative with such a mundane task in order to become better educationally equipped. Students go so far as to get away from their electronics in order to better study for their finals.
“I always go to the library or sit where I can’t reach my phone so I can stay in a productive place,” junior Carter Phutawon said.
Students study in different ways however, with some focusing on replicating what they believe the final will feel like in order to be mentally and emotionally ready for test day.
“I tend to focus on practice tests when I study for finals,” sophomore Nicholas Melnick said.
Conversely, many students turn towards a more fun and visually entertaining way to study, looking forward to the bright patterns and interactive nature of different study games.
“To review, I use a lot of Quizlets, Blookets, and review packets,” junior Addison Dockins said.
Overall, there are a plethora of different techniques students use to study for finals. No matter what, the study techniques used are incredibly important, as students must be not only able to memorize content, but to engage with it and understand it.
Necessity of Finals
When studying, there often arises the question regarding the true necessity of finals. While some students believe finals are necessary for a teacher to understand the success of their learning, while others believe if they have already shown an understanding for the content a final is unneeded.
Some students believe that finals are important, although stressful. Many fully support the need for this final testing, as they understand the reason behind them.
“Finals are helpful to show what we’ve learned over the years,” junior Addison Siminski said.
Finals, although important, exhaust students and have the potential to cause an end of year burn-out as students debate the true importance of finals alongside attempting to work through this tough time.
“I think finals are necessary, but they’re also very exhausting. I think they need to be spread a bit more apart to make them more manageable,” Dockins said.
Finals are supposed to be utilized by teachers to gauge the effectiveness of the curriculum alongside the comitance of students. However, in the process, finals exhaust and stress out students, and as such act as a double-edged sword.
All-in-all, finals are undoubtedly important to a student’s success in a class, but they must be handled with care and perseverance in order for students to be successful.
