Argumentative Essay: My Senior Year Of High School

On paper a test to administer to high school seniors to graduate seems like a great idea, but in reality it is not. As I have entered into my senior year of high school, I have had a surprisingly abundant amount of work thrown at me. Senior year has only just begun, and I have already had to start applying to colleges, studying for both the SAT and the ACT, and keeping up with regular homework. If seniors were given another test to take to graduate we would only be forced to study more. Senior year is hard enough trying to figure out how to take on more adult responsibilities in a few short months with application deadlines, scholarship finding, and trying to decide what high school seniors finally want to be when we grow up. It’s stressful trying to keep up with the classwork

and to deciding what seniors want to do for the rest of their lives. Most students like myself already have a tough workload with having those last AP classes, maintaining a high enough GPA to scrap by, rushing to make sure SAT and ACT scores reflect our intelligence enough and the biggest stressor of all waiting around to hear which colleges sent acceptance letters. I know as a senior I’ve done my time. I do not want to do any extra work that has no correlation to earning my diploma because I have just spent three other years breaking my back over mandatory standardized tests, mandatory core classes, mandatory attendance, all put in place to create a system to graduate. Senior year has been hyped up to be one of the best years of our lives. Seniors should not have to worry too much about our past but to look forward into our future through applying to colleges. We have worked too hard our first three years because in reality, colleges make decision on our first three years anyways. Yes keeping up grades, doing well on tests, continuing to go to school are still very important, but if you spend all of your time on school work then you will miss all the fun that is to be had in your last year of high school. On top of looking mostly at our first three years, in order to get into colleges almost all of them want an applicant to have taken the SAT or ACT. These tests show our level of intelligence and already are stressful enough to make sure we score high. For example the college admittance department at Ohio State will not meet all 10,000 applicants. It is easier to scan over the standardized application, look at their test scores and cumulative GPA, and maybe an essay if the applicant is lucky enough to have gotten to that stage.

Seniors have to make ourselves stand out and that's enough pressure. Having to take another standardized test to move onto the next level of schooling would also provide another wall for students that may not be the regular A+ student. Some students do not do well on standardized tests. Lots of students excel in only a one or two subjects so if they were forced to take a test on something they do not do well in then they are not going to do well. These students try their best to get to college and having another standardized test could crush their chances at getting out of any situation they may be in. The fact that high school’s could also be creating more problems for colleges by making yet another number for college admittance offices have to look at. Colleges all around the US and the world look at millions of applications. Yes - they do want great students to come to their colleges, but they do not want high school’s to bump up the amount of numbers that colleges have to look at to make decisions. So in conclusion high schools seniors should not be made to take a standardized graduation test simply because of the fact that their is simply too much to do in your last year of high

school.