With finials coming up next week, I find myself studying more and more. Studying for finals in college has seemed to be way more important than studying for finals in high school.

In high school I didn’t study nearly as much as I do now. I don’t know what is was about high school, but I really seemed to be lacking effort during those times. I contribute this to all of the homework we had to do in high school. For me, it seemed like I would a least get a couple of hours a homework every day. Since there were so many graded assignments throughout the semester, it made our finals seem much less important.

In high school we had homework every single day. I also seemed to take many more tests, quizzes and project. I believe that the sheer volume of assignments made my high school finals feel way less important. It felt like our finals didn’t carry that much weight because of all the other assignments.

Now from my experience in college, finals are way different. There are fewer assignments and many more projects. Lots of the assignments I have now are much more important. The project and other assignments that I have carry much more weight than in high school. Every assignment seems to have a purpose in college. To me, every assignment seems important and I feel that it makes a much bigger impact on my grade.

Overall, I feel that studying for high school finals and college finals are much different. High school has more assignments with with less weight, which made finals seem less important to me. In college I have less work but there is a greater sense of importance that I didn’t experience in high school. High school tests tend to be given more frequently than college tests. Therefore, high school exams cover less material than college exams, making them feel much less important to me.

I am not as excited as I thought I would be about going home for break. Our winter break is longer than usual this year, its about two months.

Before I got adjusted to college I thought that I would be super excited about break. Have two months off seemed like a dream. In high school, we would often have under two weeks off for the holidays. I remember wishing for a longer break, it felt like we barely had any time off from school. If I had two months off then, I could not tell you how happy I would have been.

As the last few weeks of the semester are coming to and end, I find myself not very excited for break. One reason is because I know that I am going to have to work and save as much money as possible during this time. Even though it’s during break, the thought of working forty hours a week does not make me very excited to go back home.

Another reason I find myself not wanting to go back is because of all the new friends I’ve made. One of my favorite parts about college so far is the fact the I basically live right next to all of my friends. Over break, I’m going to miss being able to walk down the hallway of my dorm and hanging out with friends in their room. I feel like I’m going to be much busier over break, and hanging out with friends is going to be less common.

Overall, I am not super excited for break. Working all the time is going to make me miss my new friends and the fun times I’ve had at college so far.

As the semester comes to a close, I find myself wanting to do schoolwork less and less. I am happy with my decision to be at school I just find it is harder than usual to stay on track.

One reason I believe that I have been feeling unmotivated recently is because grades are not updated as much as they were in high school. In high school, I remember seeing my grades change every day. This made me want to work harder, actually seeing my grade being affected with each assignment. The reason I feel less motivated is because I’m not seeing my grades change on a day to day basis. This makes me think that assignments don’t have as much weight, since I am not seeing the initial impact.

Another reason I feel unmotivated is because of the COVID regulations. I support most of the regulations, but it makes it harder to enjoy your college experience. Since we are not allowed in other dorms besides our own, I find myself spending more time in my room then I would like. For me, it makes it much harder to want to sit at my desk and do work. This is hard when I just sit it my room anyway. This gives me much less motivation, especially because we have been more cooped up then usual.

I hope that next semester the restrictions are less strict. For me, next semester is going to feel like a fresh start. Lightening up on the restrictions would definitely make my college experience more positive.

Sources: https://www.cogniaim.com/webtheme/img/bb01.gif