Let me go ahead and state the obvious: If senioritis is a disease, it is the best one ever.
No matter how many speeches our administrators give on how we might not graduate, or how many times our teachers bemoan our poor work ethic, I refuse to believe that this last semester is anything less than magical. Even as my grades sink at a speed that would make the Titanic seem positively seaworthy, I can not help but love the fact that, for once, I can do things I really care about.
After all, for the vast majority of us, the administration only ever had one carrot with which to coax us through year after year of unnecessary Honors courses, monotonous standardized tests, and questionably-honorable Honor Societies: the college admissions letter. But here we are, admissions letters in hand, and with them is our freedom.
The misconception, I think, is that senioritis is just some particularly virulent strand of laziness. And laziness is certainly part of the problem: after nearly four years of sleep-deprivation slaving away over Physics problems and history essays, of course we are going to slack off a bit. But I think it’s unfair to put all the blame on us seniors. Are the seniors in our drama department, who performed for British royalty in March, lazy? What about the seniors in Applied History, who get out of school only to do hours of historical research or lead tours of Arlington House? And what about the seniors who already committed to a career in the armed forces? Are they “lazy” for being more interested in researching career paths and staying in shape rather than spending their time annotating page after page of Crime and Punishment?
It’s safe to say that we seniors sleep in a little more often than juniors, and we probably do watch a bit more Netflix when we have the chance. But perhaps the administration, rather than reading off 90-minute Powerpoints during senior meetings and attempting to scare (or bore) us into dutifully jumping through the same hoops that we’ve been navigating since freshman year, might benefit from a bit of introspection. As senioritis makes painfully clear, the only reason most of us try in school is to get into college. Without the crippling fear of rejection from our dream schools, there are precious few reasons, beyond a few exceptional teachers and the occasional class that truly engages us, to even show up, let alone do our homework or study for tests after 2:10.
Students will always be interested in learning. But if the school can’t provide an environment that is dedicated to finding our passions and embracing them, or really learning in that genuine way that I think we all have a natural desire for, I think it’s unfair to put the blame on us seniors for preferring the more engaging environment of IHOP to WS.
But hey, maybe I’m biased. After all, I’m one of those seniors afflicted with this terrible disease. I’ve been spending the past semester studying Russian flashcards, planning out a sermon for my church’s youth Sunday, and doing everything else my school work kept me from doing since my freshman year. So go ahead, call me lazy. If you want to say it to my face, I’ll be in the cafeteria, with the Ping Pong club. So what if I can’t put “master of ping pong serves” on my college apps?