Opinion: This piece expresses the views of its author(s), separate from those of this publication.
“It’s safe to say that each year, as you prepare for final exams, you collect more and more experience in building healthy and effective study habits that will assist you down the road.” – Natalie Elliott, a staff writer at Lake Forest High School.
Yes, in a way, it’s true, when students complete finals, it challenges them and tests their knowledge. However, for us, it can be very stressful. Stressful to the point that we can’t focus, study or prepare. We already have tests throughout the semester, which measure how well we learned a specific unit. So the question remains, why do we have finals?
Most students get stressed just thinking about finals to the point where many don’t study or focus on them. We walked around the school and brought up finals, to which most of the students groaned and rolled their eyes. “Finals bring a lot of unnecessary stress, because sometimes you don’t know what is going to be on the final. So it just causes a bunch of stress and anxiety,” senior Inder Collins said.
“Many students feel their future depends on their performance, creating immense pressure to succeed.” – Cesar Serrano, Photographer from Augustus F. Hawkins High School.
This is true because many students believe that if they receive poor grades, future colleges may not accept their applications, as they also consider academic records. A bad grade on a final can impact your overall grade in the class. A borderline grade can easily fall if a student is not a strong test taker or if they get overwhelmed by the stress.
Dr. Kimberly Garrett, the head principal of Norman North High School, has an opinion on finals:
“They probably add to student stress, but short-term stress is not always a bad thing.”
While it is true that short-term stress can be beneficial. Finals are not the only time when students experience stress. “I experience stress every day,” said sophomore Greycie Diaz. “When teachers give out homework, it stresses me out because we already go to school from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and sometimes we do extracurricular activities, so we don’t have time to do homework. Even if [Teachers] don’t give out homework, they don’t always give enough class time to complete assignments.”
According to Garrett, finals carry the following benefits.
“1) To help move short-term memory knowledge and skills into long-term memory by reviewing past knowledge and skills again 2) To prepare for college courses where minimal grades are taken so all tests are worth a lot more points toward the final grade 3) To provide a classroom teacher with more information about what students have learned in a course.”
Short-term memory and long-term memory don’t come naturally to students; we as students don’t have the resources for certain things, and because of that, some students struggle to study effectively. It’s a focus issue; they are too busy to do so, or they don’t know where to get their resources.
I know a girl who can recall things that happened just a minute ago or less. She has asked me more than once what her next class was and where. Some people can’t remember things for a month if new information is constantly being presented to them. Yes, it might help with the memories, but it doesn’t really work at all. Finals are also given to prepare for college, but a lot of college finals are very different from high school finals.
Colleges use a more challenging, broader range of material, and it is weighted more heavily in the final grade, often requiring more extensive preparation, unlike high school finals.
“In recent years, assignments and activities that focus on rote memorization have been replaced with ones that promise to promote higher-order thinking. So-called “choke and puke” learning (due to the idea that students choke down information only for the purpose of regurgitating it for a test) is often regarded as old-fashioned and meaningless.”Kids Can’t Remember Anything – Laura Hudgens
Overall, we believe finals are a significant source of stress and often feel like a waste of time. Instead, we would like our tests to serve as a measure of learning rather than a cumulative final exam.
