The Dreaded Graduation Application

Exams, term papers and finals. Oh my! The last few weeks of the semester for a college student are some of the most stressful weeks every year.

All of the work a student did during the beginning portion of the semester is almost irrelevant in comparison. If a student had a bad semester, it can all be washed away with a strong finish; however, if a student had a good semester, it can too all be washed away, but because of a bad showing in the end.

Colleges house some of the most highly stressed people in the world because of its competitive atmosphere and the importance of having a college education for the professional world.

There is also pressure to pass classes because no one wants to have to take a class over again. And with tuition increasing more and more every second it seems, it is not always an option to take classes over and over. Taking classes until one passes, obviously will prolong the amount of time one will have to be in school, and, therefore, keep the bank account dwindling away.

Something else I have recently discovered as a new form stress, well not necessarily a new form of stress, but another reason to stress, is the graduation application.

As a college student, you finally get to the point of realistically thinking about graduation and graduating, and this blasted application comes along to put this egg shell around you for the next, and your last, year.

You are suddenly asked to say what classes you have left to take before you are able to graduate. This may not sound like as big of a deal as I am making it out to be, but think about it. When you look at the remaining classes you have left before graduating, you are also looking at the classes you cannot screw up in. Because if you do not pass one of them, then it is another semester stuck in college.

That is another semester of tuition, a parking permit, not to mention the fee for pushing back graduation another semester. But worst of all, having to retake a class you just failed.

Then you try to see the silver lining: “I am only taking this one class, so I can focus solely on it, and everything will all be fine. Think of all the free time I’ll have too.”

Then the stress seeps in: “If I don’t pass this class when it’s the only one I’m taking, I’m really screwed.”

That is another semester of tuition, another parking permit and another fee for not graduating.

All because of the damn graduation application.

Now your stress is stressing. The stress as a college student becomes the stress as an athlete in the last seconds of the championship game. Passing those final classes is like being down by a point and shooting two free throws with no time left on the clock.

In terms of ways to manage the stress, I don’t know. Do yoga, go for a jog, take some vitamin-B.

I am not, and have never been, a person who others envy, but the one thing I have been frequently told is a desirable characteristic that I possess, is the ability to remain calm in every situation and not let things get to me.

So being a, for the most part, stress free person, my advice is to just know that everything is going to be alright. It sounds cheesy, but there are a lot more important things in life, and that school is only a small part of it.

But if my advice just sounds ridiculous to you, then going back to the free throw reference, don’t miss.