If one was to ask what the most stressful part of high school was to high school students, the answer that will most likely come up is big tests. High school students these days go through an immense amount of stress at this stage in their life. Students do not have enough time to balance all that they have on their plate; therefore, provoking stress to finish all the schoolwork and other activities. To add on to all this stress is the college admittance tests, which can push the student off the edge of sanity due to the deficit of the amount of time. While high stake testing such as the SATs and ACTs are beneficial to college admittance, these exams should not be weighed so heavily because some students are not good test takers, these high …show more content…
Some students can have test anxiety, which is a condition that affects one’s memory. During a test, the student with test anxiety will forget the material during the test, resulting in a poor grade (Test Anxiety 1). Test anxiety can destroy confidence and self-esteem from getting just one bad grade on a test because of the fear of getting another bad grade on a test (1). The fact is that a student may believe a high stake test will make or break one getting into college, which adds on pressure to the student in trying to get a perfect score on the high stake test. College admittance boards should not put this much pressure on one test because one test does not define a student’s perseverance and hard work. While, for those who have test anxiety or are just bad test takers, taking the SAT or ACT is not …show more content…
The biggest stress in a high school student’s life is, in most cases, school. Researchers have found that the time to have the most stress is in the pre-teen and teenager years (Rudolph 2). Teeanagers have to deal with so much in their life, that it can become quite stressful, especially with the school aspect. School work can be a huge factor to stress in a high school student’s life, especially high stake testing, so to minimize the stress in a teenager’s life, the pressure of doing good on every school related work should be decreased by lowering the stakes. School is not the only cause of stress to high school students, there are other outside sources of stress. Examples of stress from outside sources are family or friend issues, living conditions or the environment, or the stress of thinking about what one will do in the future, which is dependent on getting into a good college. There are many different beliefs for the cause of stress, such as distress responses caused by outside events, troublesome environments, and a person’s take on these conditions (Rudolph 1-2). Everybody has different types of stress, different stress levels, and different ways of dealing with the stress. There is only so much that a person can take when it comes to stress, if a person reaches the maximum for stress, the person will not know how to deal with all
Thousands of students around the country and around the world will be preparing for the SAT and ACT tests while trying to maintain a high GPA. These tests will potentially have a significant impact on students' lives. Some will be taking these tests for the second or even third time to get that 1500 out of 1600 or that 33 out of 36, that they long desire. These flawed tests are not truly able to measure how well students will perform in college as they are supposedly used to predict. A single test that students have to wake up for at six, seven in the morning on a Saturday and travel to some random location to take a difficult test should not impact the student's chance of getting into college, let alone predict how well they will do in college.
Getting into college requires students to make an assured grade on a standardized test called the American College Test. High school students begin in kindergarten preparing for tests; to make it to the next level you have to score a certain score. Pressure is forced upon many students when they begin sophomore year and begin to ponder the thoughts of college and life after high school. Once they have planned out their school, major, and work life after college, the school counselor plans a meeting to discuss the ACT. Students begin to be worried and anxious about grades and tests; all of these stressed students do not realize they have been passing test after test to score a good enough grade to get into college, where they will begin to take test after test to graduate college and even after college, these students will still be tested within their workforce.
Standardized tests have been a scourge of student life in America for more than fifty years. Throughout the United States, high school students prepare for months for the day in which they have to take out their No. 2 pencils, to endure four everlasting hours of bubbling-in answers. The ACT, American College Testing, and its counterpart, the SAT, Scholastic Assessment Test, are known as the high school exit exams, in which they have become one of the largest determining factors in the college-admissions process. Both standardized tests judge a student 's performance, in which it measures how well students learned skills to meet state standards. Although standardized tests are meant to measure what one learns in high school in order to determine
The United States is a country focused on bettering an opponent, but some people aren’t cut out for the constant competition. Those members of society seem to be left in the dust and expected to fend for themselves. Because of the pressures being placed on Americans, it is almost natural to constantly search for a sense of comfort and relaxation. A variety of coping methods have been published in books and articles by psychiatrists, but the audience in which they are written for is rapidly expanding to younger generations. People too often make the assumption that damaging amounts of stress do not surface until college and early adulthood, but studies over the past five years show that stress takes an overwhelming toll on high school students.
The movie Buddy 1997 tells the story of how an animal lover named Mrs. Trudy taught Buddy, a gorilla, on how to act like a person, but things got complicated when Buddy grew up and became stronger. Then a traumatic event happened to him, whenever he feels threatened, he smashes everything he sees. Mrs. Trudy attempted to eliminate Buddy’s trauma, but unfortunately she failed. With that, she just decided to let go of Buddy for her family’s sake and for Buddy’s sake also. There were two types of classical conditioning illustrated in the movie. First was the intended type of conditioning and the second was the unintended type of conditioning. The intended conditioning
Stress comes from many areas of life especially as an adult student incorporating school at a time in life when family and work are paramount. “Adults just returning to school have substantially higher anxiety about school in general and writing in particular than younger students.”3 Stress, best described by its "synonyms: strain, pressure, (nervous) tension, worry, anxiety, trouble, difficultly"1 has a medical history "According to the American Psychological Association, the majority of office visits to the doctor involve stress-related complaints, and stress is linked to the six leading causes of death: heart disease, cancer, lung ailments, accidents, cirrhosis of the liver, and suicide."2 If managed, stress can be a way to inform me; learning how to recognize my level of stress capacity is important. The Holmes-Rahe Life Stress Inventory 5 http://www.stress.org/holmes-rahe-stress-inventory/ is a list of stressful events that contribute to illness. My personal score on this life stress inventory is 236; I fall in the category of about a fifty percent chance of a major health breakdown in the next...
Every teenager deals with stress, some teenagers stress daily, weekly even monthly. It’s just stress; it’s not a big deal right? Wrong. Studies have shown that stress over a long period of time can damage our body’s immune system and cardiovascular system.(G. Neil Martin, pg.188) this proves that stress can hurt our body. High school students deal with more things than just homework in today’s generation: ‘’Many teens today deal with the death of a classmate by murder, accident or suicide.’’(Gwen K. Packard, pg. 33) These every day worries contribute to teen stress. High school students deal with ridiculous amounts of stress every day, there are many ways to relieve this daily stress.
Standardized tests like the SAT and ACT are on everyone ‘s minds as the November 1st early admission deadline approaches. As a high school senior I know that it is a very stressful time. The competition is intense, we are not only competing with people from our school for a slot in a college class, but we are competing against students across the nation. The competition is between people from every background imaginable; public schools, private schools, AP, honors, and academic classes, wealthy, poor, Black, White, Hispanic, Asian, etc. Students are encouraged to continue their college education at colleges and universities throughout the country; however, many students are discouraged from doing so because of the barriers that standardized tests put up. Every high school senior has one of those secret little numbers, and according to my teacher, that number determines our ability to study and succeed in college. The College Board claims that the SAT is a standardized test, which means that all high school students across the U.S. take the same test. On the surface this assumption seems true, but a closer look reveals test scores that are determined by factors such as money, gender, test anxiety and even race. For most high school students who want to attend an elite college, the SAT is more than a test. It is one of life’s greatest landmarks.
Test anxiety or stress can impair students’ academic performance on standardized tests and thereby hide their true abilities and strengths. Anthony Pasquale quotes, “… Intensive standardized testing not only causes stress in students but may undermine learning," wrote Daniel Edelstein in an article for Brain Connection. “Stress is the body's general response to any intense physical, emotional or mental demand placed on it." Stress undermines learning because it affects the way one thinks. Tests stress some people out in a harmful way, and what happens when stressed out students take tests? Normally not good results…” The education system is putting too much emphasis on testing and not seeing the consequences on student’s mental health. I am personally affected by standardized tests because these tests potentially determine my future. I experienced anxiety, severe panic attacks, and headaches because I was stressed thinking about the tests or simply not concentrating while taking the tests. I know my education has a power to determine my future through the years coming, but I am exhausted at the fact that a grade on the tests determines my
Most students experience some degree of test anxiety. Test anxiety refers to a combination of physiological, emotional, and psychological components that are caused by the stress of taking exams. This may interfere with one's ability to think, reason, and plan. For some students, test anxiety is an unpleasant experience but doesn't necessarily interfere with exam performance. For other students, however, test anxiety is not only an unpleasant experience but also seriously interferes with exam performance.
Studies have shown that many college students are not able to handle the stress while in school, which hinders the ability for the brain to act in a normal way (Shahrokh and Hales, 2003). If a person is unable to deal with the stress that one is being faced with, it will have negative consequences in terms of causing several psychological disorders (Canby et al., 2014). Entering post-secondary education is a completely new environment for students, as it can be tough for many to adjust to the new surroundings. There are many factors that cause stress when students enter college, as it can include having the ability to deal with lower marks (Struthers et al., 2000) and having to create a new social life. Once and if a social life is established, it can cause more stress among students because it can lead into peer pressure that results in risky behavior. In particular, peer pressure can cause alcoholism or drug abuse (Seiffge-Krenke, 1990) or it can also cause unprotected sex. Not only does stress revolve around peer-pressure, but it can also be caused by headaches and lack of energy. If a student is constantly staying up late to finish assignments or to study, it can cause headaches from the lack of sleep; thus causing stress. With all the given factors, it can be hard to overcome these external factors which can ultimately lead to stress among
In today’s world, education is more important than ever, and with education comes homework. However, many teachers give too much homework, which makes students extremely stressed. In addition, some are into sports or after school activities, and some have part time jobs they have to work at, which adds additional stress to the already overworked students. Mounds of homework can cause students to be under so much stress that it affects them mentally, physically, and emotionally. Stress can make students sick with colds, stomach aches, high blood pressure, sleep disorders, and/or anxiety disorders (Menninger and Dugan).
“‘I am stressed out’ is a phrase that has been echoed by teens down through the ages” (LaRue & Herrman, 2008). The adolescent years are a time of heightened stress. Adolescents experience a myriad of stressors, the most common being school, money problems, and relationships with parents. Active coping is the most commonly used strategy that teenagers employ when facing stress. Stress management programs can be beneficial to adolescent stress when they teach critical thinking and coping skills for handling stress. As a future psychology professional, the research can be used to develop best practices for stress management in adolescents.
Are the new standards and expectations the world has for teenagers really creating monsters? The amount of stress that is put on students these days between trying to balance school, homework, extra curricular activities, social lives, sleep and a healthy lifestyle is being considered a health epidemic (Palmer, 2005). Students are obsessing over getting the grades that are expected of them to please those that push them, and in return, lose sleep and give up other aspects of their lives that are important to them, such as time with friends and family, as well as activities that they enjoy. The stress that they endure from the pressures of parents, teachers, colleges, and peers has many physical as well as mental effects on every student, some more harmful than others. The extreme pressure on students to get perfect grades so that they will be accepted into a college has diminished the concept of actually learning and has left the art of “financing the system” in order to succeed in its place (Palmer, 2005).
Academic stress is very common in student’s lives. Many students assume that making the academic experience their first priority now, will increase the chance of success in the future. School is an important aspect in most teenagers lives and by being so important a teenager can become depressed very effortlessly at school or because of school. Academic stress can take complete control over a student’s life, sometimes leading to depression. At school this may lead to poor attendance, a significant drop in grades or even annoyance with schoolwork, in a good student. There are many studies that have been performed to prove the correlation between responsibility in school and academic performance being the cause to academic stress. Just like there are numerous causes to academic there are also numerous cures, such as changing mind set and behavior. Academic stress is something majority of students in school can relate to and the cause of it can be something small as a bad grade on an evaluation, It will enforce the student to try harder in the future but it will for sure cause some sort of stress, even if it is for a moment. Stress from school can be one of the most essential causes of teen depression.