Senioritis

Jayla Herrington explores the the Senioritis phenomenon as it fills the halls of LHS

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De'aja Williams

The countdown to graduation continues as students begin to prepare for finals.

“I’ve learned everything I need to know for life”

“Colleges don’t even look at this year!”

“I have a good grade in this class, if I skip it I’ll be fine.”

If you have said any of these sentences then you may very well have Senioritis. This is a very common topic considering that 95 out of 100 seniors begin to feel this way as they are during their last semester of high school. Still, there are those who continue to push through strong and have a steadfast look on school: students who know that education isn’t over after high school, and the students who just love school.

Then there are students (like myself) who have been religiously counting down the days until we walk across the stage to freedom. Senioritis can affect you in so many different ways.  Students don’t even realize that they are experiencing it until it’s time for graduation.

LHS senior De’aja Williams leaves school early as a result of the crippling boredom associated with her Senioritis.

What is the exact definition of senioritis? According to google chromes definition of the word,  “Senioritis is a colloquial term mainly used in the United States and Canada to describe the decreased motivation toward studies displayed by students who are nearing the end of their high school, college, and graduate school careers, or the end of the school year in general. It combines the word senior with the suffix -itis, which technically denotes inflammation but in colloquial speech is assumed to mean a general illness.”

But to define it simply, Senioritis means that you begin to not care about your attendance at school,  and when you go to school that feeling of being excited to learn something new is slowly but surely going away. You might even begin to feel like there is no need for you to be at school at all!

Students cut class outside of Lafayette High School–a classic example or Senioritis.

The effort to do your work and do it correctly is not there anymore. The key thing is you begin to feel like it is all or nothing. I interviewed two high school senior students and one high school teacher to get the thoughts of other students and teachers to understand their personal opinion on Senioritis.

I’ve taken the liberty of going around Lafayette high school to get people’s opinions and experiences with Senioritis. I discovered two different points of view. One of teachers, watching students go through it, and one of seniors and how they feel it effects their last year of high school.

 

I asked each person the same Four Questions:

1) what comes to mind when you hear the word ‘Senioritis’?

2) what makes you feel like you have Senioritis what is a clue to someone having Senioritis?

3) How much has your outlook on high school been effected by this? Lastly Number

4) how would you keep from letting it get your off track and school work and your attendance for school?

And here is what they had to say on the topic:

Leon Wilson – “Senioritis has affected me greatly! I have always loved to learn but now I feel as though I am more ready for college than I ever was. My senior year I have not learned many things. Just making sure I have all the credits I need, a lot of last minute things but not anything new. I realized I had Senioritis when I started to lay in the bed in the morning and say, well do I really need to go to school today? I won’t miss anything. I used to have perfect attendance but now I could really care less. Hopefully I could find a new light in school that will make me look forward to it again, if that happened then I wouldn’t miss school as much.”

Courtney Johnson- “I seriously don’t feel like being here anymore. All I do is come to school to go right back to sleep in class because now it is just becoming a waste of time. I’m in 3 classes that I do not need for graduation.”

Jennifer Swinson (teacher)- “I definitely understand why someone has Senioritis because teachers can get the same thing. We get tired of teaching because it’s the end of the year and everyone is ready for it to be over. But I will say Senioritis has the biggest impact on my students. Students begin to not come to class, they don’t want to do the work assigned to them. I can understand, but they still need to be here to learn and get something from the classes they are taking. Once the students realize that high school still has something to offer then Senioritis wont effect as many.”

 

And there you have it, an inside look at how Senioritis makes you feel and what it looks like. This topic is viewed as a negative but I believe as a student something really positive can come out of Senioritis. It was so fun to see how other students thought about this topic and how it effects almost every senior in a different way. I’m glad to say that even though this feeling of “school is over” affects every senior, it has not caused any of us to get behind in our academic pursuits. Remember: just push through because graduation is around the corner!