For many students, March can feel like the most exhausting month of the school year. It is unlike any other month because it falls between the months leading up to the last day of school and the new year; January is all about the challenges of new beginnings, May and June bring worries of wrapping up the school year on a good note, but March brings a different challenge: burnout. By this point in the year, students have been hard at work balancing school, extracurricular activities, jobs, sports, and their social lives. The excitement of a new school year and the holidays has long since passed, replaced by repetitive and draining routines. An article from Edutopia, by writer Miriam Plotinsky, discussed the idea of “motivating students to avoid springtime burnout.” Plotinsky wrote, “Much of the momentum that teachers carefully build during the fall semester seems lost in the spring as everyone in the school building enters survival mode. The stretch between January and April tends to see flagging stamina and a downward trend of performance data.” This topic of being in a ‘survival mode’ is seen when students are counting down the days till the next break or even frantically checking the weather to see when the next warm-weather day is.
Students’ moods are weighed on the academic pressure they are faced with at this point, as well as the unpredictability of March weather; one day it feels like spring is finally here, then the next is full of gray skies and cold winds. With this weather, students feel as though they are moving closer towards summer and then moving even further backwards. At this time as well, teachers are preparing to teach some of their final units, beginning to review for AP exams, and giving out large projects. Emma VanGemert, 12, said why March is a burnout month for her: “March is when dance competition season starts, as well as when my schoolwork is the worst. I have a competition literally every other weekend, plus tests every week in my classes on the hardest content of the year.” She also said that since the first semester just recently ended, all her classes are somewhat aligned to give tests the same week, as well as being a “peak time for AP teachers to cram the last units in before the exams”. VanGemert is faced with another specific challenge that only seniors can relate to: senioritis. From Merriam-Webster dictionary, senioritis is defined as “an ebbing of motivation and effort by school seniors as evidenced by tardiness, absences, and lower grades”. Senioritis, mixed with this time of year, brings out every senior’s ‘survival mode’ as they are pushing through, trying to enjoy every last moment while still working hard and having fun. Despite the stress that comes with this time of year, students continue to balance their responsibilities while counting down their final weeks of school. March may feel exhausting, but it is also a sign that the end of the school year is just around the corner.
