My spring semester in high school was very exciting because I was finally going to move on to the next chapter in my life. I had been accepted into the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) as an undergraduate student, an honors college student, a recipient of the UIC President’s Award Program scholarship, and was even admitted to graduate school through the UIC Guaranteed Professional Program Admissions for Biomedical Visualization. Knowing that I had all these great things coming my way definitely made it easy for me to forget that I was still in high school! So it got harder and harder to focus on my remaining classes, assignments, and exams because it really seemed like no one would care if I got a few bad grades during my last semester since I had already been accepted into all these programs. However, I also knew that it would look bad on my behalf if I suddenly gave up doing the hard work that I had been doing over the past four years. Therefore, I continued to complete my assignments and turn in my work.
Honestly though, I started to give more of a 90% (and sometimes 80%) effort instead of the usual 100%. But I want to state that this is okay! I was overwhelmed with new opportunities and accomplishments, so it makes sense that I was feeling a little distracted. Plus, my biggest motivating factor to not fall too much into senioritis was actually the new opportunities coming my way. I wanted to make the impression that I am dedicated to reach my goals during every step of the journey, even right at the end. If this is your experience too, where it’s your last semester of your last year in high school, give yourself a break. It’s obviously important to still put in an effort to show that you are committed to your studies but there’s also nothing wrong with taking it a step back for a bit. I advise you to talk about these feelings with people you feel comfortable with and ask them for accountability. Also make a plan for yourself; when you want to finish certain projects, what days you will focus on studying versus spending time with loved ones, how many new things you want to take on, etc. Lastly, make a list of goals! These will help you visualize what your near future holds and hopefully keep you motivated to stay on track to reach those aspirations. Best of luck!