If you ever thought it was difficult to sit through a typical workday, imagine what it must feel like to be a high school senior around this time.
With graduation coming up in less than a month, “senioritis” – the ubiquitous disease that seems to infect 12th-graders every year as their high school careers draw to a close – is making its rounds throughout high school campuses across the district. And while its presence can sometimes be seen as early as October, its effects have really started to intensify.
“I hardly study now,” said Lauren Williams, a senior at Monte Vista High School who will be headed to the University of Mississippi in the fall. “I studied for my AP tests the night before.”
Since senioritis has already taken over in many classrooms, teachers have started to notice the students’ condition.
“Not apathetic but definitely looking forward to the summer and September rather than the last few weeks in high school,” said Tim Brown, an AP Calculus teacher at San Ramon Valley High School. “In a word, relaxed.”
For the most part, senioritis stems from a student’s growing sense of apathy toward his or her schoolwork. After finding out where they will be headed in the fall, they no longer believe it is important to maintain high grades.
“I know I got into college, and I know that I’m not a junior,” said Kurt Sakata, a senior at Monte Vista who will be headed to UC Davis. “It’s been the easiest year ever because I didn’t do anything, but I’m still going to college.”
“For many students this starts once they start hearing and deciding what colleges they are going to. Once that happens, they want to coast,” said Steve Johnson, who teaches senior English at San Ramon Valley High. “For others, senioritis happens this whole year, because they see little connection between high school and the ‘real world,’ especially with a schedule that mandates that they be here the whole day, often filling up their schedule with ‘meaningless’ classes.”
But mainly, seniors simply feel that they deserve a little break after working hard for three-and-a-half years.
“They are getting close to the end of their public school careers,” said Craig Ritts, a San Ramon Valley High counselor. “I think that’s human nature.”
Seniors usually start to relax when they learn about their college acceptances, or when they realize there are only a few more months left of school. But while senioritis is prevalent on almost every campus in June, it is almost nonexistent in the opening months of school.
“The first semester was stressful because of college applications, but I’ve kind of taken this semester off,” said Nishant Batsha, a senior at Monte Vista who is Columbia bound. “In anatomy, I have a 92 percent test average, but I have a 20 percent homework average. I’m capable of doing the work, but I choose not to because there is no goal that I’m working toward.”
As difficult as it is to be a senior at this time of year, it has been equally difficult for teachers instructing seniors. Besides preparing their daily lesson plans, they must deal with an increased sense of apathy in their classrooms.
“As a teacher of seniors, it’s always a struggle,” said Johnson.
School administrators continue to stress the importance of working hard, even if it is the final semester of high school. At the end of the year, every student must submit a final grade report to the university where they were accepted. If their grades slipped considerably from their previous years, then the universities reserve the right to rescind their applications, said counselor Ritts.
More important, however, the final months of high school serve as a steppingstone to the first few months of college.
“Because many senior students have not been rigorous in their studies, I believe this makes the college transformation even more difficult because instead of two months off they’ve had four months or longer choosing to not be intellectually challenged,” said Johnson. “This makes for a pretty steep learning curve.”
For the time being, teachers have been trying everything to keep their seniors actively engaged. Perhaps Brown found the perfect ailment to deal with senioritis in his AP Calculus class: He has the students play two games of cricket each week.
Kevin Zhou is a senior at Monte Vista High School and an intern at the Danville Weekly, where he is still giving 100 percent. He will attend Harvard University in the fall.
